21 years ago at the age of 9 I was reading a cartoon by Lat. The cartoon was about Anwar Ibrahim trying to cajole his compatriots in office then to read Confucius. This was a man I thought, at that age seemed like the type of person I would have wished to grow into. Obviously, none of that happened but it never occurred to me to waver my voice. Today, that same man in Lat's cartoon has been convicted for a crime in which he was acquitted in 2012. Only, to be vindicated again in 2014 in a farcical drama which displayed how the judiciary process is no longer on the side of the Malaysian people. I cannot even begin to understand how it is possible for a man who was acquitted only to be vindicated twice again?
In the years where UMNO had raised power and might within a Malay Malaysia it had seemed that this power is cracking like a broken mirror. Malaysia is no longer a wholly Malay majority and as painful as that might be to many Malays we cannot turn our backs to the realization that Malaysia needs to reform a community where it would be able to cater to a multi-lingual, multi-racial society. It is an extremely difficult task to balance that act and Anwar has shown his ability by moving PKR forward and creating opposition ties (while frosty) enough to win Permatang Pauh. It was for this reason, this insatiable fear that it was seen that Anwar has got to go. But with this?
What baffles me is fairly simple. The judges have announced that whether or not the act was consensual has no bearing upon the case. However, its fairly simple - if the act was consensual therefore, Saiful is also an accomplice and ergo, should receive the self-same treatment Anwar went through. The law is not partisan, it is not selective, it would be pertinent then to suggest that Saiful should serve imprisonment as he himself had announced to the world repeatedly that he was sodomized - accomplice! It is regardless that Anwar is the penetrator and Saiful is the recipient. Both committed the act of sodomy (why this law even applies here I can never understand, Malaysia has had its fair share of gay parades, you don't see the lot of them being locked up) but why Anwar?
It is inconceivable that a 60 year old man tells his 20 plus year old assistant to bend down and sodomize him. He must be a very fit 60 year old. Personally, whatever rocks your boat, man! But there you go, this young man did not put up a fight. Probably, just nodded yessir and pulled his pants down. If this man is honestly heterosexual he would not just take off his pants and allow another man to sexually assault him. There are no straight men in this planet who would even allow another straight or gay man to sexually assault him without putting up a fight. And this young man has the audacity to come up in public - swear his uncountable swears that he did just that. He acquiesced to his sexual harassment and not just that mind you, he let more than 24 hours to pass to report the incident and was accompanied by his uncle and then manages to continue his relationship forthwith get married have a kid and had an (unconfirmed) affair with his own prosecuting counsel.
I have met and known many people who were sexually harassed and were raped as children. None of them are able to behave as Saiful did. Is it empowerment? I doubt it - blogging about his reality and his marriage and child without a hint of painful suffering at the hands of his former mentor. Real angry people display anger. It takes years of healing and process and removal and the weight of shame as a male heterosexual man to be sexually assaulted. We live in a hypermasculine society and what Saiful did is either heroic or salaciously foolish. No man will appear in public and admit that they were sexually assaulted let alone have his photos of his personal life plastered everywhere like a celebrity. While I do feel bad for real people who were sexually assaulted whether male or female or straight or gay I do not see this in Saiful. He does not elicit my sympathy. He has been an unrealiable witness from the get go.
For Anwar, while the verdict is painful - the Malaysian government has handed his martyrdom on a silver platter. He is the hero in exile and how many heroes in exile have we known to become great? From thousands of years from the exile of Ram to the exile of the Jews, the exile of the Muslim prophets to the late Nelson Mandela. Exile only brings martyrdom. And with martyrdom I hope that Malaysia is one step closer to their emancipation.
