Photojournalism | Malaysia Day and Independence Day Celebrations

© 2011 Wazari Wazir | Malaysia’s Prime Minister Najib Razak waves his hand towards the crowd, during the double celebrations Malaysia Day and Independence Day in Kuala Lumpur September 16, 2011. Malaysia celebrated the 48th anniversary of the union of Malaysia as well as the 54 years of the countrys independence. On the background is the clock tower of historical Sultan Abdul Samad building, among Kuala Lumpur famous landmark other than Petronas Twin Tower

© 2011 Wazari Wazir | Malaysia’s Prime Minister Najib Razak ( standing second from left on the platform ) raise his hand and shout “Merdeka” during the double celebrations Malaysia Day and Independence Day in Kuala Lumpur September 16, 2011. Malaysia celebrated the 48th anniversary of the union of Malaysia as well as the 54 years of the countrys independence. On the background is the clock tower of historical Sultan Abdul Samad building, among Kuala Lumpur famous landmark other than Petronas Twin Tower…

This is for the first time that Malaysia Day and Independence Day were celebrated together, Malaysia Day happened on September 16 and our Independence Day is on 31st of August but because on that day, the 31st of August 2011 is the second day of Eid al-Fitr, the government decided to celebrated this historical event on Malaysia Day which falls on September 16.

This is quite a rare moment, usually when the celebration ends, the Prime Minister and all the cabinet ministers will leave this place just after The Yang di-Pertuan Agong Tuanku Mizan Zainal Abidin King of Malaysia  and the Raja Permaisuri Agong Tuanku Nur Zahirah (Queen) of Malaysia, leave the stage but the Prime Minister decided to join the crowds and he leave the stage behind right under the Sultan Abdul Samad clock tower there and come forward to get close to the participants of the parade and take the opportunity to say a few words.

For this particular photographs I decided to use 24mm wide angle lens to include the background, which is the Sultan Abdul Samad building among the most famous landmark in Kuala Lumpur. At first I was shooting at the ground level and later on decided to step back and climb the platform where thousand of student perform their human graphics and took the shots. I think the impact of this photograph can only be felt if this particular picture especially the one with thousands of the crowds were printed big in wall size and with that in mind, I quickly change the settings of my camera from Jpeg to Jpeg+RAW and if somehow my department decided to print this picture wall size, then it should be no problem.

There are many ways to photograph this scene, some photographers like to get close, to get a tight shots, just the Prime Minister and the cabinet minister on the stage only and some photographers just wanted to photograph the Prime Minister and the human graphic only. There is no right and wrong about the choice of one photographer decision and the other, it’s up to their personal intention, for me I like to photograph the Prime Minister and the environment and I’m glad to know that the following day, some newspaper decided to use photograph (not mine) taken from this angle, from where I took this picture as their front page double spreads.

Usually when covering this huge event, newspaper or news agency will send few photographers to cover this event, my department alone send more than ten photographers to cover this event, everyone has been given their own task. One of the photographers were station at the top of Kuala Lumpur City Hall building to get a better shots of human graphics and the full view of Independence Square where this celebrations being held.

Other photographers were given the task to focus their lens on the VVIP on the centre stage only with 300mm prime lens and other photographers will take a general view of the events, candid shot of the people watching this events, the parade and all kind of things since this event is quite big and it was quite impossible for just one photographer to do his job well if they want to cover everything as a visual documentation of this historical events.

I know that some international news agency just send one photographer to cover this event because they only need certain type of picture or scope to highlight this particular event. For our photo department (Information Department of Malaysia), we need to cover a lot of things because a lot of government agency depend on our photographers to get their pictures, we need not only concentrate on the King and the Prime Minister but also other ministers as well and about the parade, we need to cover almost everything.

The main thing when covering this event is a teamwork, and usually few days before this celebrations took place, there will be a rehearsal, most photographers will come and see the flow of the event so they can have an idea where to position themselves but this one, I mean for this particular moment, is not part of the plan, and sometimes this kind of things, or something that is unexpected make covering this celebrations is something to be remembered and I’m happy that I was here to freeze this moment forever.