Kit Siang: Student's jailing shows our justice system SUCKS

DAP advisor Lim Kit Siang has come out in support of jailed student and 'Occupy Dataran' participant Umar Mohd Azmi, saying his imprisonment showed the country "criminal justice system still sucks".

"Despite all the sloganeering about government, economic, educational, social and political transformation programmes, the criminal justice system in Malaysia still sucks even under the four-year premiership of Najib Razak," Lim said.

Last Friday, Umar, 23, was handed a one-month jail term and a RM1,000 fine by the magistrate’s court for obstructing a Kuala Lumpur City Hall officer from apprehending fellow activist Fahmi Reza during their protest camp-out at Dataran Merdeka to oppose the National Higher Education Fund Corporation (PTPTN) earlier this year.

However, the High Court today allowed Umar's application for a stay of execution pending his appeal.

Lim said the jail sentence on Umar made him a cause celebre, and expressed regret that he could not visit a protest camp set up by students outside the Kajang prison where he had been detained because he was abroad, adding that it reminded him of the movement to free his son and DAP secretary general Lim Guan Eng when the latter was jailed for 'false news' in 1998.

Lim stressed that Umar's conviction offered yet another "powerful reason why there must be change of Federal government in Putrajaya".

"The stark failure whether under Najib or his predecessor Tun Abdullah to reform, let alone transform, the criminal justice system after the ravages to the justice system caused by the 22-year Mahathir premiership, has been vividly highlighted by the Umar case, when compared to the many unresolved mega-scandals of injustices in the country, whether it be the murder of the Mongolian Altantuya Shaariibuu, the murder of Teoh Beng Hock at MACC premises or the host of mysterious deaths and killings while under official custody, like V. Kugan," said Lim.

-Harakahdaily