A 23-year old cyclist was this morning arrested over an alleged scuffle with Kuala Lumpur City Hall (DBKL) officers during a protest against the local authority’s move to impound parked bicycles.

Dang Wangi police chief Sukri Kaman told Malaysiakini the cyclist will be remanded tomorrow.

He said a police report was lodged by a DBKL officer who was allegedly assaulted by the cyclist at about 10.15am.

According to police, the complainant was on duty at the DBKL building when he saw a group about 15 people put up banners protesting the move to impound bicycles.

“The complainant had ordered for the banner to be taken down but they refused.

"When the complainant and three other colleagues wanted to take down the banner, a man had came forward and assaulted the complainant.

"The suspect was arrested and handed over to the police,” police said.

'Bleeding from handcuffs'

Eyewitness Mar Ibrahim said she was among the group of some 40 cyclists who rallied to highlight the problems faced by cyclists around Kuala Lumpur.

This was after a messenger was fined and had his RM3,000 bicycle damaged while it was impounded by DBKL, after he locked it by a road side recently.

The cyclicts complain that they are forced to park their bicycles on the roadsides because there are no available bicycle racks.

Mar said they had chosen to gather during DBKL’s fortnightly ‘Car Free Day’ initiative held around Dataran Merdeka to highlight the contrast between its green policies and actions to impound bicycles which helps to reduce congestion around the city centre.

She said they had cycled the short distance from Dataran Merdeka to Jalan Raja, where the banners were raised at a bus stop nearby DBKL’s building.

She however claimed that a scuffle had ensued when a group of plainclothes officers issued orders for the banners to be removed.

 

 

“This quickly escalated into a scuffle and one of the person who was holding the banner was detained in the process by at least four plainclothes officers.

“He was handcuffed and the handcuff was so tight that his wrists were bleeding,” said Mar.

She also alleged that the suspect was slapped by an officer in a DBKL van used to take him away to the police station.

“The other cyclists were also intimidated, heckled, and boo-ed by over 30 DBKL officers who stood in three rows next to the DBKL van,” she further claimed.

‘Meeting with DBKL’

Separately, bicycle shop owner Akmal Azfar Abdul Mutalib told Malaysiakini he had before the incident met with DBKL’s executive director in charge of town planning to discuss the need to provide proper parking bays for bicycles.

“We had a brief meeting with Datuk (Mohd) Najib (Mohamad) who promised to look into our request.

“He also asked for our input on the best way to resolve the bicycle parking issue,” he said adding that he had left the scene at the time of the alleged scuffle.