In a clash, democracy always comes up tops
MALAYSIANS stand in solidarity with the world in mourning for the victims of the terrorist attack on London and the death and serious injury of innocent civilians from several countries.
As a British politician said, an attack on London is an attack on the world. London is the inspirational city for freedom, democracy and tolerance for most countries, particularly those in the British Commonwealth. For many Malaysians, the city is like our second home for education, vacationing and business.
London is the birthplace of the parliamentary system of government which most of the world adopts as the ideal system of governing. It provides checks and balance against abuse of power, in line with peoples’ expectations of what good government means. The freedom of expression and individual beliefs gives ordinary people the best protection against oppression and exploitation by those in power.
Malaysians admire the courage of the British people in defending the values that they hold dear and which they have fought for with their lives over the centuries. We are also confident that the UK can overcome and defeat the terrorists because those who use violence on innocent civilians are exposing their own weaknesses. They will be consumed by their own religious hatred and cruelty and fail, just as other militant movements have collapsed and fizzled into oblivion.
It’s time for political ideologists, of whatever shade, to realise an important fact of world history - in the clash of civilisations, democratic values have always come out the winner.