Health Minister Dr S Subramaniam today said he did not want to get into a war with his colleague Tourism Minister Mohamed Nazri Abdul Aziz who had contradicted him on whether there had been a cabinet decision to repeal the Sedition Act 1948.

He added that regardless of whether it was a repeal or replacement, what was important is that the concerns with regard to the Sedition Act are addressed.

azlan “I think we don’t want to have a war, in principle, we are all agreed... If we can address the issues through the Harmony Act, then repealing the Sedition Act is fine.

“The fundamental thing is the two aspects are met. One is freedom is guaranteed and the second is that the stability of the country and sensitive issues can be addressed,” he told Malaysiakini at the Parliament lobby this afternoon.

Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak had in July last year pledged to replace the Sedition Act with a National Harmony Act, but several ministers in his new cabinet following the general election have voiced out against the move.

It is also unclear now whether there would be an amendment or a total repeal of the law as the premier in an interview with BBC early this month had said that the Sedition Act would be amended.

‘Cabinet did decide’

However, Subramaniam acknowledged that the last cabinet had already decided that the Sedition Act be replaced.

“The cabinet decision was to withdraw it and replace it with the National Harmony Act, but the National Harmony Act is still not in place, so that is the issue.

“As long as the cabinet decides now to go full force with the National Harmony Act, that it is formulated and drafted, at that stage then we can talk about a repeal,” he said.

On Monday, Subramaniam had said that the premier's proposal to replace the Sedition Act with the Harmony Act was merely a suggestion which had to be reviewed by the cabinet.

However, Nazri insisted that the last cabinet had already decided to replace the law and said that Subramaniam may have forgotten due to “too many meetings”.

Both Nazri and Subramaniam were part of the previous cabinet where they held the positions of minister in the Prime Minister’s Department and human resources minister.

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