• Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • Home
  • About
  • Contact
  • RSS
  • Archives
  • Subscribe
The Nut Graph

The Nut Graph

Making Sense of Politics & Pop Culture

  • Projects
    • MP Watch
    • Found in Conversation
  • Current Issues
    • 6 Words
    • Commentary
    • Features
    • Found in Quotation
    • News
  • Columns
  • Interviews
    • Exclusives
    • Found in Malaysia
  • Multimedia
    • Audio
    • Pictures
    • Videos
  • Corrections
  • Letters to the Editor
  • Vault
    • Found in Translation

New party to champion Indian M’sian rights

[get_post_meta single=1 key="byline"] | May 19, 2009 1 Comment

PETALING JAYA, 19 May 2009: A new Indian Malaysian party, Malaysia Makkal Sakti Party (MMSP) — a breakaway faction of the Hindu Rights Action Force (Hindraf) — was officially launched today to champion the cause of the community.

Led by former Hindraf National Coordinator RS Thanenthiran, the party hopes to unite Indian Malaysians under one banner and provide a legal platform to continue the banned movement’s struggle to uplift the marginalised community.

“We came a long way and cross many obstacles throughout our struggle to champion the cause of minority Indian [Malaysians],” said Thanenthiran in a press conference today.

The party membership is limited to Indian Malaysians only. This, Thanenthiran explained, was because the Indian Malaysians are still lagging behind. “We can’t reach them [to help them] without singling them out first.

“This party will house Indians from all walks of life under one umbrella besides acting as a bridge to unite the multiracial people of Malaysia to realise the vision of ‘One Malaysia concept’,” said Thanenthiran.

The MMSP president also said he would be meeting both Barisan Nasional (BN) and Pakatan Rakyat (PR) leaders in the near future.

“We are independent, [but] we will work with any coalition or party we believe would benefit the Indian [Malaysians] at large … We are the people’s party, wherever the people are, we’ll be there,” said Thanenthiran.

Expressing confidence that MMSP will attract Hindraf supporters, Thanenthiran said he expects to recruit around 300,000 members by June 2010. To get the ball rolling, the party is offering free membership to the first 100,000 members.

Crucially, the MMSP president said the party will continue to participate in Hindraf’s struggle.

“Hindraf is in our blood … We would like to thank Waythamoorthy (Hindraf chairperson) and all the other Hindraf Makkal Sakti supporters, who became the instrument for the birth of this party.

“This party would be able to function as legal platform to continue the struggle,” said Thanenthiran, who described his current relationship with exiled leader P Waythamoorthy as being “good”.

Unlike Hindraf, Thanenthiran said the MMSP would eschew street demonstrations and negotiate with the government before taking to the streets in the future.

“When the necessity arises, we’ll still go to the street. [However], if there is a platform for discussion or forum, we would make full use of the platform first,” Thanenthiran explained.

Also present at the press conference was was MMSP patron P Thiagaraja, deputy president M Waythamuthi, committee members M Loganathan and B Susila.

Genesis of MMSP

Thanenthiran’s decision to form a political party to ride on Hindraf’s coattails first came to the fore during the Bukit Selambau by-election in April.

Upset at the candidate fielded by Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR), Thanenthiran had initially said he would call on Hindraf supporters to boycott the by-election. However, the movement decided to back the PKR candidate after Waythamoorthy issued a formal statement on the matter.

Then on 17 April, Waythamoorthy suspended him as Hindraf coordinator along with nine others, and Thanenthiran announced plans to form his own political party.

Waythamoorty had also stated that he would prefer that Hindraf remains a political pressure group. However, he added that he would not stop any Hindraf leader from forming a political party.

Share this:

  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on WhatsApp (Opens in new window)
  • Click to email this to a friend (Opens in new window)

Related Stories

Filed Under: News

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. mike says

    May 19, 2009 at 10:48 pm

    It’s waste of time and smells of BN manipulation from the speed it was registered and approved. Close shop ler it’s a waste of time.

Primary Sidebar

Search

Twitter

My Tweets

Recent Comments

  • Wave33 on The Nut Graph stops publication
  • Adam on The Nut Graph stops publication
  • PSTan on The Nut Graph stops publication
  • PSTan on The Nut Graph stops publication
  • Andre Lai on The Nut Graph stops publication

Recent News

  • The Nut Graph stops publication
  • Nasihat tentang sepupu yang mengganggu perasaan
  • Uncommon Sense with Wong Chin Huat: The Sunni-Shia split and the answer to Muslim unity
  • Why Malaysia needs the national unity bills
  • Challenging government in the digital age: Lessons from Kidex
  • Najib’s failure
  • Babi, anjing, pondan: Jijik orang Islam Malaysia
  • Kidex and the law – What the government’s not telling you
  • Beyond Dyana Sofya
  • Uncommon Sense with Wong Chin Huat: Does Malaysia need hate speech laws?

Tags

Abdullah Ahmad Badawi Anwar Ibrahim Barisan Nasional BN Bukit Selambau by-election dap Deborah Loh Ding Jo-Ann Election Commission elections Found in Malaysia Found in Quotation Gan Pei Ling government high court Hishammuddin Hussein ISA islam Jacqueline Ann Surin Khairy Jamaluddin KW Mak Lim Guan Eng Malaysia MCA Menteri Besar MP Watch Muhyiddin Yassin muslim Najib Razak Pakatan Rakyat Parliament Parti Keadilan Rakyat pas Penang Perak PKR police politics prime minister Selangor Shanon Shah Umno Wong Chin Huat Zedeck Siew

Footer

  • About The Nut Graph
  • Who Are We?
  • Our Contributors
  • Past Contributors
  • Guest Contributors
  • Editorial Policy
  • Comments & Columns
  • Copyright Policy
  • Web Accessibility Policy
  • Privacy Policy
The Nut Graph

© 2022 The Nut Graph

loading Cancel
Post was not sent - check your email addresses!
Email check failed, please try again
Sorry, your blog cannot share posts by email.