We have many more besides demo

Many of my friends thought all DEMA fellas are "kaki demo". Every now and then, they will ask me :"Where are you going to demonstrate today?" In fact, demonstrating is only part of our life. We have various type of activities, including movie screening, exposure trips, workshops, training camps, discussion sessions etc. Besides, we also love clubbing and "lepaking".

We often organise exposure visits to the squatters settlers(or a politically correct phrase, urban pioneers) The residents are facing many problems. The government (sometimes developers) has treated them unjustly, by evicting them from the land that they have worked and developed for many years. Rather than learning the issue from unfair media reports, we prefer to learn from the people themselves. We talk to them personally; they shape our perspective properly.

We had organised a two day trip to Kuala Selangor. We were able to enjoy the gorgeous scene of fireflies hanging around the trees. Some of them looked exactly like Christmas trees. We had also discussed on some environmental issues, particularly on how dam affect the environment. (p/s: the government approved a project to build a dam in Sungai Selangor. The project could affect the salinity of the downstream river and might have an adverse impact on the Berembang trees.) For further information, please go to www.sos-selangor.org


DEMA organises workshops and training camps every year. Those activities are specially organised for students from various universities and colleges. Among others, Human Rights Camp is one of our heavyweigh event. The participants were actively taking part in one of our workshops (picture).

Other than having programs in the central part of Malaysia, we had also "explored" to the North. In 3 cars, we had gone to Penang, Kedah and Perlis. We had visited some local community groups such as SOS Penang and the Kangar Community Centre. The Indera Kayangan by-election was just over then. We were managed to discuss on the by-election with the person in charged of the community centre cum Indera Kayangan candidate, Cikgu Koh. The sincere man had enlightened us a lot. We had also visited the beautiful campus of the Malaysia Northern University (UUM) in Kedah and the famous Gua Kelam in Perlis.