No surprises, Dewan Rakyat passes PCA amendments

PARLIAMENT The Dewan Rakyat has passed the Prevention of Crime (Amendment and Extension) Bill 2013 past midnight today, thereby providing Putrajaya with wide-ranging powers to detain suspects without trial for up to two years, which can be extended for another two years.

The amendments were stringently opposed by human rights advocates and opposition lawmakers, who argued that detention without trial was not only affront to principles of justice, but also warned that it can be abused.
However, Putrajaya had argued proper safeguards such as an advisory board, that will conduct an inquiry into each case before handing out the detention order, would be in place to prevent potential abuses.

The debate on the bill went on from 11.30am on Tuesday until 12.50am early this morning, with the Parliament clock being stopped in order for it to be voted on.

It was finally passed with the ruling party refusing to entertain any opposition suggestions to amend the bill further.

A bloc vote was called before the bill could proceed to the final committee stage at 6.40pm in the evening, but the opposition could only muster 66 votes to BN's 115 in their attempt to stop the bill from proceeding.
Opposition motions rejected
Later during the bill committee stage, which went on for five hours, a number of bloc votes on motions by Pakatan Rakyat lawmakers for further amendments to the bill were called, but were all defeated.

Hanipa Maidin (PAS-Sepang, left) had proposed that section 3 of the bill regarding the preamble of the Prevention of Crime Act 1959 be struck out.

His motion was subsequently defeated which means that the Act will have the same preamble as the Emergency (Public Order and Crime Prevention) Ordinance 1969, a powerful law that allows for detention without trial which was abolished by the government two years ago on human rights grounds.

Tian Chua (PKR-Batu) called for a bloc vote in relations to Nga Kor Ming's (DAP-Taiping) proposal to amend the bill to allow legal representation for those arrested the law, but opposition also lost that bloc vote.

In total, six opposition members had tabled 10 proposed changes to the amendment bill as they attempted to remove elements of detention without trial and allow for judicial review under the amendment bill - all were rejected by the BN-dominated House.
However, the only concession made by the federal government was to increase the number of advisory board members from three to five, though it would not alter the nature of the bill in any way.
The proposal was made by Home Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi (left) himself and was passed unanimously.

Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak and Deputy Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin both came to the Dewan Rakyat to help pass the bill at the committee stage earlier.

When the bill was finally passed, Zahid congratulated speaker Pandikar Amin Mulia for having presided over the sitting for eight and a half consecutive hours.