Quit witch hunt over rally, UM told
Umno and DAP are again at loggerheads, this time over the rally involving 2,000 students and supporters at Universiti Malaya on Monday night.
While DAP urges UM to drop its police report on the matter and concentrate on improving its ailing rankings, Puteri Umno wants action on those who broke the lock at UM’s gate to enter the campus for the talk by PKR de facto leader Anwar Ibrahim.
Umno and DAP are again at loggerheads, this time over the rally involving 2,000 students and supporters at Universiti Malaya on Monday night.
While DAP urges UM to drop its police report on the matter and concentrate on improving its ailing rankings, Puteri Umno wants action on those who broke the lock at UM’s gate to enter the campus for the talk by PKR de facto leader Anwar Ibrahim.
“UM’s administration should take an enlightened attitude to what happened on Monday, admit it had made a colossal blunder in the lockdown and power black-out at Universiti Malaya.
“(It should) enlist the support of university students, alumni, academicians and the Malaysian public to restore academic freedom to regain the university’s international repute for academic excellence in its early decades,” DAP’s parliamentary leader Lim Kit Siang ( left ) said.
Lim said that going on a “vengeful” campaign to penalise students and academicians who attended the rally would actually hurt UM's reputation further.
Puteri Umno chief Mas Ermieyati Samsudin, however, disagreed and urged action to be taken against the students for breaching university regulations.
She told Umno Online that not taking action would signal that the university is weak.
“The event was abused and seem like a platform to goad and exploit students to take to the streets to support the personal agenda of the opposition leader,” Mas Ermieyati ( right ) said.
She added that the incident also brought shame to the university and its alumni.
UM on Tuesday lodged a police report on trespass into the campus during the rally.
University management had locked down the campus in anticipation of the event, which it labelled as “illegal”.
However, students and supporters stormed the gate, broke the lock and then marched the Dataran Dewan Tunku Canselor for the student union-organised talk.
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