Anwar claims trial over Bersih 3.0 charge

PKR de facto leader Anwar Ibrahim, along with party deputy president Azmin Ali and former party supreme council member Badrul Hisham Shaharin are charged today at the Kuala Lumpur Sessions Court with participating in a street protest under the Peaceful Assembly Act.

Anwar, along with his wife, Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail, arrived at the Sessions Court 5 at 9.15am.

In a strange twist, former solicitor-general II Mohd Yusof Zainal Abiden, the lead prosecutor in Anwar's Sodomy II trial, will be teaming up with senior counsel Karpal Singh in defending the opposition leader.

Mohd Yusof resigned from the Attorney-General’s Chambers at the end of the sodomy trial.

Anwar told Sessions judge Mahmud Abdullah that the charge was yet another “political” campaign mounted against him, and he pleaded not guilty.

Both his lawyers, Karpal and Yusof, asked that Anwar be allowed to be given personal bond but deputy public prosecutor Abdul Wahab Mohamad objected.

Judge ordered bail to be set at RM500 and fixed July 2 for mention.

Meanwhile, Azmin who was represented by lawyers Sivarasa Rasiah and Gurcharan Singh, and Badrul Hisham, who was represented by lawyer Latheefa Koya, were also ordered to post RM500 bail each.

Among the opposition leaders spotted in court were DAP supremo Lim Kit Siang (right) and PAS MP Dr Mohd Hatta Ramli.

The three PKR leaders are the first to be charged under the recently passed Peaceful Assembly Act, of which Anwar and Azmin may lose their post as elected representatives if found guilty.

The trio could be fined RM10,000 if convicted of the offence under the Act. Elected representatives will automatically lose their post should they be convicted by a court of law and punished by a fine of over RM2,000 or a jail term of more than one year.

The three are charged under section 4(2) (c) of the Peaceful Assembly Act with participating in the Bersih 3.0 rally and violating magistrate Zaki Asyraf Zubir's court order dated April 26 which prohibits the gathering at Dataran Merdeka and the area bordering Jalan Sultan Hishammuddin, Jalan Raja and Jalan Kelab.

They allegedly committed the offence between 2.30pm and 3pm on April 28.

Additional charge

They also face another charge under the Penal Code with disobedience to an order duly promulgated by the magistrate to be with more than five Bersih 3.0 supporters and conspired with R Tangam, G Rajesh Kumar and Farhan Ibrahim @ Alias by inciting them to breach the barricade surrounding Dataran Merdeka and could have caused a riot or clashes in the area.

Anwar and Azmin are accused of abetting this with Tangam, Rajesh Kumar and Farhan. Under section 188, they stand to face a jail term of up to a month or a RM400 fine, or both.

Tangam, was the first to be charged on May 3 under Section 143 of the Penal Code for participating in an unlawful assembly, which was read together with an alternative charge of breaching a court order under Section 188 of the Penal Code.

Lawyer Rajesh Kumar and van driver Farhan, who is also a PKR Youth exco member, were also charged after Tangam.

[More to follow]