Kerajaan masih berdiam diri dengan semua lapuran polis yang dibuat oleh Ezam - begitu juga dengan Akta Hasutan terhadap Ezam. Jika kerajaan Mahathir menang - pasaran akan beranggapan Mahathir memang dalam bahaya untuk digulingkan. Ini suasana yang tidak menyenangkan iklim pelaburan.

Sebaliknya, jika Akta Hasutan digugurkan, kerajaan akan membaling telur busuk ke muka sendiri. Isu ini mungkin mahu menakut-nakutkan pembangkang - tetapi ia akan semakin menguatkan penentangan. Itulah yang terjadi bila Anwar diaibkan serta dihukum di mahkmaha yang sudah tidak dipercayai oleh rakyat kebanyakkan. Ini semua hanya akan mempercepatkan Umno semakin tenggelam.

Kalaulah Ezam dibicarakan dan disabit kesalahan, ia mungkin tampak menguatkan Mahathir. Dia mungkin berkata:

"Tengok! Saya telah memberitahu kami kuasa luar sedang memerangi kita"

Inilah taktik yang sudah lama diguna pakai bertahun-tahun oleh beliau. Tetapi ia hanya laku pada warga tua dan orang lama sahaja. Golongan muda yang tentunya lebih ramai akan mengundi pada pilihanraya yang bakal tiba sudah semakin menjauhi partinya. (Mahathir mungkin boleh gembira beberapa ketika tetapi tidak lama kerana dia sendiri sudah menjadi liabiliti kepada Umno. Kebangkitan rakyat Kedah sudah mengguris parut ke mukanya dan gambar Asiaweek semakin mencederakan imejnya. Bila rakyat dan pelabur sudah menggeleng kepala - itu tanda hayat kuku besi kuasanya untuk tamat sudah tiba....

-TJ Kapal Berita-

http://www.asiawise.com/mainpage.asp?mainaction=50&articleid=1235

Malaysia

Draconian measures

The arrest of Ezam Mohamad Noor, the leader of the youth wing of the National Justice Party (Keadilan), suggests that Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad is willing to play ever-harder ball against those who openly protest the imprisonment of former Deputy Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim.

It will be interesting to see what comes of the case against Ezam. The government has put itself in a "put up" or "shut up" position with such serious charges. If it manages to win a sedition case (and it probably will, since Malaysia courts are famously pro-Mahathir), that will also suggests to markets that maybe the government is in great danger of being toppled. That does not suggest that Malaysia is a great place to put your money. If the sedition charges are dropped, the government will end up with egg on its face. The aim seems to be to scare the opposition since being charged with sedition is no light matter. Instead the case may galvanize the opposition. Still, that was supposed to happen when Anwar was imprisoned and there he still sits with only incremental victories by Keadilan and the Islamist PAS ever since. But the reflexive resort to the courts by the Mahathir-dominated United Malay National Organization-dominated Barisan Nasional (BN) doesn't bode well for reasoned discussion. Mahathir and his current heir apparent Deputy Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi battle it out with Keadilan for the allegiance of the Malay majority while much of the Chinese population is casting its lot with the BN because they are scared of the pro-Islamic hue of the pro-Anwar forces.