After a year in jail, Anwar still key politician

After a year in jail, Anwar still key politician

By Ranjan Roy

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP): Leaping up a flight of stairs
from an underground tunnel for convicts, Anwar Ibrahim steps into
a blue-carpeted courtroom and morph into his former self.

The one-time heir to Malaysia's political throne leans across
a wooden rail, hugs his relatives, waves and shakes hands with
his supporters and in hushed tones talks to his political allies
until a guard nudges him toward the dock.

One year ago, Anwar was the second most powerful and popular
politician in the country, as deputy prime minister and finance
minister.

Then on Sept. 2 last year, Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad
abruptly sacked Anwar, accusing him of being a homosexual,
corrupt and plotting to topple him.

Anwar, who vehemently denies the charges, was convicted of
abuse of power and is now serving six years in solitary
confinement while standing trial for allegedly sodomizing a
former family driver.

At the Sungai Buloh prison clinic, until an even more isolated
cell is complete, Anwar reads and does prison chores like
painting walls. Guards don't let him get too close to fellow
inmates. Even during communal Muslim prayers, he is brought in
last and is first to be taken away, says his wife Azizah Ismail.

The year has left Anwar, 52, pale and thinner. His ironed
shirts hang loose on his drooping shoulders and his bald patches
are more pronounced. But he ensures a dignified and stylish
presence in court for his trial, carrying a brown leather
briefcase, wearing jeweled cufflinks and polished black dress
shoes.

Locked away from public gaze, Anwar is even more charismatic.
Despite Mahathir's best efforts, he has created a martyr who has
hurt a carefully manicured political landscape which has been
controlled by his United Malays National Organization (UMNO)
since Malaysia became independent in 1957.

Anwar posters, pins, T-shirts, cassettes of his speeches and
books about his life flourish as fast as the government tries to
erase him from public memory.

His photograph, the right fist raised in defiance, deep
bruises around the left eye punched by the then-police chief on
the night of his Sept. 20 arrest, is now a symbol of state
oppression. The cry Reformasi, the Malay word for political
reform, reverberate at opposition rallies.

"Previously the ruling party was considered unassailable. Now
there is serious talk of forming an alternative," Anwar told The
Associated Press in a written reply to questions.

"In recent times we have never witnessed such debate on
corruption in high places, abuse of police powers and instruments
of government," he said.

Surrounded by computers spewing out real-time evidence and
arguments, a battery of top government prosecutors sit in the
courtroom trying to prove that Anwar is a homosexual, a crime in
this predominantly Muslim country. Defense lawyers, one a senior
opposition lawmaker, in turn attempt to prove a political
conspiracy behind the charges.

Anwar's lawyers may be losing the battle, but outside the
courtroom, Anwar allies are gaining ground.

Roused by the public outcry over Anwar's treatment, an
opposition hounded into near oblivion during Mahathir's 18-year
rule sprang to life. Parties shed mutual suspicions and racial
and ideological barriers to form a coalition in the name of
making Malaysia more democratic.

Thousands have braved the government's wrath to join
opposition rallies, especially those attended by Azizah, who
heads the new National Justice Party.

Until last year, politics rarely intruded into the lives of
ordinary Malaysians. But the Anwar case jolted the usually placid
Southeast Asian society and people increasingly voice their
opinions and flaunt their views by pasting stickers and flying
flags of opposition parties on their cars. Executives wear
Justice Party tie-pins and new opposition magazines flood the
newsstands. New websites, accessed by thousands each day, spout
venom at Mahathir. A popular one promises "a much clearer window
to the outside world and even back into our own country."

"The Anwar episode triggered something that was underlying,
like the storming of the Bastille triggered the French
revolution," said Rustam Sani, a political science professor and
popular newspaper columnist.

He recalls how pro-Anwar activists threw paper balls and soft
drink cartons at government leaders at UMNO headquarters the
night he was expelled from the party.

"Never before in the history of Malay politics has something
like this occurred."

Yet the opposition holds only 25 of the 192 seats in
Parliament, so few expect a major turnover after general
elections, which must be held by June 2000.

Meanwhile, Anwar's family suffers his absence. Azizah and
their six children only get to visit him once a month and must
talk through a glass partition.

"I think he tries to shield us from the prison conditions,"
says Nurul Izzah, 18, explaining her father's reluctance to
discuss the harshness of solitary confinement for a white-collar
crime.

"We are getting used to the new life, but the pain is always
there."