Shagadelica

MGG Pillai passed away peacefully earlier this morning.

For those unfamiliar with MGG, he is perhaps the country’s most prominent columnist, having witnessed the birth of Malaya in 1957 and seen four prime ministers come and go.

But he will not get the pomp and gradiouse obituaries that befit the grand doyen of op-eds. Why?

Because, what he wrote created great discomfort to those in power.
Because, he didn’t kow-tow to the powers that be, even when he was sued by Vincent Tan. He had a bazooka especially made for Mahathir and Umno.
Because, from the start of the Anwar saga until his last breath, he was one of the finest among the reformists, who never gave up hope, who critiqued where needed and who knew the meaning of friendship and faith in people with ideals.

Frankly, there isn’t anyone who can fill those big shoes he left behind.

Even this morning, while he was in the hospital, he had the courtesy to call up the editor of Malaysiakini.com, to apologise for not being able to send in his column for the week, because he was, at that time, not feeling well.

Shagadelica salutes this wonderful man who lived by the word and died by the word. We have but one regret, that is, we wish we had the courage to give you a nice bear hug whenever we saw you.

Rest in Peace, dear Sir, and we shall meet in due time, at a place where more stories can be weaved and where we can see your eyes twinkle once more.

In memory of a fine gentleman – MGG Pillai, 1939-2006.

This entry was posted on Friday, April 28th, 2006 at 6:28 pm and is filed under R.I.P.. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.