2007 Bersih Rally

The 2007 Bersih Rally was a rally held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, on November 10, 2007. The aim of this walk was to campaign for electoral reform. It was precipitated by allegations of corruption and discrepancies in the Malaysian election system that heavily favor the ruling political party, Barisan Nasional, which has been in power since Malaysia achieved its independence in 1957.

Much of the publicity for the rally was distributed through online media and blogs. Initially, the organisers planned to have a gathering point at Dataran Merdeka square. However, it was later revealed that this was a red herring to distract the police. The locations of the four gathering points were only released the day before the protests by word of mouth, mobile phones and emails.

Consequently, the rally began with gatherings of people at four locations: Sogo department store, Masjid India, Masjid Negara and Pasar Seni. These four groups of people combined into a single group on their march towards the palace gates to hand over a memorandum to the King demanding electoral reform. Early estimates put the number of attendees between 10,000 to 40,000. Plans called for 100,000 people to join in the rally, and there are claims that this number was indeed achieved, as the many early estimates failed to include those who simultaneously gathered at different locations and those that were barred by police from continuing the walk.

The title of the rally is derived from the name of the organizers, BERSIH (Coalition for Clean and Fair Elections). The word "bersih" means clean in Malay.