About 200 university students held a 90-minute peaceful protest outside the Parliament building today demanding for fairplay during the upcoming campus elections.

The students held placards with caricatures of the Higher Education Minister Dr Shafie Salleh, that were peppered with the words such as, 'blur' and 'I don't know', in reference to the minister's recent comments on the campus elections.

They also unfurled a banner that read 'Students demand for clean campus election, free campus', while sporadic chants of 'student power' was heard a few times.

The event was organised by a student coalition under the name 'Malaysia Students Solidarity'.

The group was unable to handover a memorandum to the minister this morning, as the minister was attending the weekly cabinet meeting.

Parliamentary secretary to the ministry Dr Adham Baba and Shafie's aides later met with the group. After some haggling, Adham agreed to hold a meeting with five of the group's representatives.

A closed door meeting was then held, while Adham's aide promised to organise a press conference later. Another aide turned away reporters from the meeting room.

However after the meeting ended, the aide told reporters there is no need for a press conference and reporters were unable to reach Adham for comment.

Isolated case

One of the representatives present at the meeting, Ginie Lim, described the meeting as "disappointing" as she said Adham did not satisfactorily answer their queries.

"The meeting only lasted about five minutes, he didn't give any statement and said he has no right to give comments on behalf of the minister," she told reporters.

According to Lim, Adham also referred to a case where an University Malaya student was assaulted by an university official, as an "isolated case".

Lim who also acts as the group's secretary, added that Adham received the memorandum from the group and said the ministry was still in the midst of finalising the date for campus elections.

On Tuesday, Universiti Sains Malaysia has announced that the nomination has been fixed for next Monday, while polling day will be held on Thursday.

While other universities have not issued any notice, campus elections in all 17 local universities were traditionally held simultaneously.