The Malacca state government directive to reduce the number of pigs in the state to 48,000 heads requiring culling or removal of some 6,000 pigs a day till September 21 is most arbitrary, unreasonable and inconsiderate and should be immediately revoked.
Although the Housing and Local Government Minister and MCA President Datuk Seri Ong Ka Ting said after the Cabinet meeting yesterday which discussed the pig-farming issue in Malacca that the Cabinet was not stopping the pig-farming activity, such a statement is made meaningless by the high-handed action of the Malacca state government requiring the culling or removal from the state of some 6,000 pigs a day for a 17-day period till Sept. 21.
The mobilization of some 2,000 personnel from various agencies, including the Police Federal Reserve Unit (FRU), Immigration, Environment, Rela, state and local government authorities resulting in a tense nine-hour standoff with defenceless men, women and children at Paya Mengkuang defending their pig farms which represent their very livelihood, was a major blot which marred the 50th Merdeka Anniversary celebrations not only in Malacca but throughout Malaysia.
It would have taken the authorities a week or two to mobilize some 2,000 personnel from various agencies to launch such a massive operation against the pig farmers in Malacca state.
The question is why the MCA leaders, in particular the MCA elected representatives at the national, state and local government levels were completely in the dark about such a massive operation which would have taken one if not two weeks to organize.
If they had no inkling of such a massive operation against the pig farmers in the state, they are clearly redundant, irrelevant and useless as elected or appointed representatives of the people at all three tiers of government.
If the MCA national, state and local government representatives had been aware of such a massive operation beforehand and yet did nothing to stop it and to give advance notice to the pig farmers, then they had been guilty of gross dereliction of their political responsibilities.
Either way, the MCA national, state and local government representatives should be censured in the strongest possible terms for their total failure in all three tiers of government, resulting in the nine-hour standoff between a fully-armed 2,000-strong contingent backed by the police riot squad, personnel in “space-suits” and a hovering helicopter on the one hand and defenceless men, women and children on the other out to protect their ricebowls.
The high-handed method in mobilizing a 2,000-strong contingent to use force to reduce the number of pigs by some 100,000 heads was clearly not the way to resolve the environmental problems of the pig-rearing industry — showing utter contempt not only for the citizenship and fundamental rights of the pig farmers but also the principle of the rule of law in the country.
The environmental problems of the pig-rearing industry in Malacca must be brought back to the negotiation table to be resolved in a way fully respecting the rights of all Malaysians, with the state government abandoning its strong-armed tactics and solutions.