It was the proverbial straw which broke the camel’s back. It was another gathering in a series of anti-ISA gatherings which took place in Padang Timur in PJ, an old haunt of mine. Such gatherings had gone on peacefully, without incident, in the past. Parents would bring their children, songs would be sung, speeches – not of the incendiary nature, as far as I know – were made and candles were lit.

This time, the atmosphere was different. The FRU was gathered at the same venue and exerted their imposing presence. Without warning, while the protesters were singing the national anthem, the FRU rushed into the crowd, causing people to run and disperse in all directions. Eyewitness accounts indicated that a few of the protesters suffered minor injuries as a result.

Some of the crowd decided to gather again, this time outside the PJ Civic Center. The FRU faithfully followed them there. Once again, the protesters decided to sing Negaraku. Once again, the FRU charged into the crowd. This time, the DAP state assemblyman for Kampung Tunku, Lau Weng San, was attacked when he questioned the actions of the FRU. Also beaten, but less severely, was a friend of mine who is also the MP for PJ Utara, Tony Pua. They were taken into police custody as were 20 other individuals and put in the lockup overnight. All but one were released in the morning and Tony and Weng San headed straight for the parliament (after a shower and a change of clothes, presumably) to highlight the incidents of the previous night to the press.

I have always found the ISA to be a reprehensible law from a human rights perspective as well as how it has been used and abused by the authorities as a pretext to arrest opposition politicians and activists. It took on a more personal nature when an uncle of mine was arrested under the ISA during Operasi Lallang. After I became a Christian and joined a church in PJ, I found out that a former senior pastor of that church was also arrested under Operasi Lallang because of some of his outreach activities and had to flee to New Zealand when he was released.

I was particularly incensed over the actions of the FRU at Padang Timur and the PJ Civic Center because of the following reasons: the protesters were peaceful, they were singing the national anthem, and a friend of mine who happens to be an MP was accosted by the police. While those arrested were not taken in under the ISA, it only strengthened my resolve against the arbitrariness of this law and the way it has been and will continue to be abused.

This was after another friend of mine, Teresa Kok, MP for Seputeh and Selangor exco member was arrested under the ISA for a week for allegedly asking a mosque near her apartment to stop broadcasting the azan. The authorities at the mosque would later deny that such an incident took place. The instigator of this accusation, the former MB of Selangor, Khir Toyo, was let off scot-free while victim of his slander was taken into custody.

My heart sank further when the then MCA Youth Chief, Liow Tiong Lai, at a press conference, refused to say that the ISA was wrongly used against Teresa Kok (and RPK, another ISA detainee who has since been released) even though he disagreed with the notion that the ISA was used to detain a Sin Chew reporter who had reported the incendiary remarks of an UMNO Penang leader, Ahmad Ismail.

In the aftermath of these events, I decided that it would be very difficult for me to support any leader who did not have a problem with how the ISA has been used to detain convenient targets that were speaking up against the government rather than being any real threat to national security. This basically meant that I would not be able to vote for any BN candidate in my constituency with perhaps the exception of GERAKAN, who has adopted a consistent stand against the ISA, even though they have not backed up this stand with any concrete actions within the BN.

I was also compelled to make a promise to myself that I would question any candidate, be it at the parliamentary or state level, who runs in the constituencies which I am eligible to vote in (Bukit Gasing at the state level and PJ Selatan at the parliamentary level) about their respective positions in regard to the ISA and what they would do to either get rid of it or to reform it in such a way as to make its abuse all but impossible. A candidate who supports the ISA as it stands would definitely not get my vote and I would probably campaign hard against this candidate by asking my friends and family who are eligible to vote in the constituency not to vote for this candidate.

But after some thought, I realized that by adopting this position, I was not too different from the single issue Christian voters here in the US which I criticized in an earlier article. I would vote or not vote for a politician solely based on his or her position on the ISA. Surely a more balanced reading of the bible requires me to examine a whole host of issues before decided who or who not to vote for? In the process of adopting this position, I am guilty of committing the same kind of transgression which I had spoken against.

Not only would it be a mistake for me to make my voting decision based on just one issue, it would also be wrong of me to try to convince others to vote based on this one single issue. After all, not everyone, and not every Christian, should place the ISA at the top of their voting priority.

To carry out my role as a responsible citizen and a responsible Christian, I should question the position of candidates on a variety of issues and not just the ISA. What is their position of sustainable development, on traffic management, on local elections, on education issues, on economic issues, and so on and so forth. Of course, during a short campaign period, it would be impossible to get to know the position of all the candidates on all the issues of importance but it should not prevent one from finding out as much as possible, either through public debates and forums, through the respective candidates’ websites, through ceramahs and through meetings with the candidates, if these can be arranged.

Furthermore, if I were to be put in a position where I could act as some sort of mediator between the candidates and their voters (such as by being a moderator in a debate or blogging about the positions of the different candidates), it would also be incumbent upon my to take a more wholistic view of the positions of the respective candidates, and not just focus on one particular issue, in this case, the ISA.

Does this mean that I should drop my opposition and aversion towards the ISA? Thankfully not. I still think that the ISA should be abolished or reformed drastically in such a way as to make its abuse all but impossible. But I also see the ISA as one of the many issues under the larger umbrella of democracy promotion, something which I am a firm believer in and which I will fight for. There are many other issues that can be lumped under this category – transparent elections, decreasing corruption, checks and balances, freedom of assembly and speech – which I think are legitimate areas in which we can base our voting decisions on. Of course, there are many legitimate issues which may not necessarily fall under this larger umbrella of democracy promotion but it would be difficult to divorce issues of larger concern from the issues that have to do with instilling democratic norms. For example, one might be concerned with achieving a steady and high level of economic growth, but this might not be possible in the face of sustained corruption among the political class.

We arrive back at the title of this article. Can I support a politician who wholeheartedly supports the ISA? I think it would be difficult in that it is very likely that such a politician also would hold views on the issues of importance in other related areas such as the need to reduce corruption, to have more transparency in the system and to increase political freedoms. But I would not discount voting for such a politician just based on this one single issue. I would push and probe his or her views on a variety of issues. And if by chance, the positions which he or she holds on the other issues can outweigh his or her unequivocal support of the ISA, then I would cast my vote for him or her.

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