Probing on technicalities a police cover-up, claims DAP
The police are trying to cover up their wrong act in disrupting the DAP's campaign against Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad's Islamic state declaration by investigating into technical offences, a DAP leader claimed today
Perak DAP chief Ngeh Koo Ham said from the line of questioning, the police appear to be looking into possible breaches of several technicalities under the 1984 Printing Presses and Publications Act (PPPA).
"It appears that they see no offence has been committed in distributing the leaflets. The article is also not seditious. It seems that they are trying to nail the DAP for not having a publishing licence," he said when contacted this afternoon.
Last week, DAP national chairperson Lim Kit Siang was detained in Ipoh for several hours after he publicly distributed leaflets alleged to contain seditious remarks about Mahathir's declaration that Malaysia is an Islamic state on Sept 29 last year. Two days later, Ipoh police raided the Perak DAP office and seized some 5,000 copies of campaign leaflets.
According to Ngeh, the police may interpret 'printing presses' as including photocopy machines printing more than 1,000 sheets per hour.
However, he added that a provision under Section 3(8) of the PPPA should exempt DAP from any offence since the law is stated to apply only to those having a printing and publishing business.
Among those called up by the police for questioning are the party's Ipoh office staff Alicia Ng and Perak DAP Youth chief Thomas Su, said Ngeh who is scheduled to meet the police on Monday, June 17.
Public worried
Ngeh also said the police refused to return the DAP's confiscated '929' leaflets.
"So far, two printing companies have now declined to print our campaign leaflets. This [action by the police] has caused undue fear among the public as they are now worried that they would also be arrested for possession of the leaflets," he added.
Among others, the '929' leaflet explained that the 1957 Merdeka Constitution clearly states the country's status as a democratic, secular and multi-religious state and that there is no such thing as a secular Islamic state.
The leaflet also said that Mahathir's Islamic state declaration was a "fundamental breach" of the social contract entered into by the nation's founding fathers and the Constitution identifying Malaysia as a progressive state with Islam as the official religion and not as an Islamic state.
For more news and views that matter, subscribe and support independent media for only RM0.36 sen a day:
Subscribe now