Padang Serai MP N. Surendran is challenging the constitutionality of the Sedition Act. – The Malaysian Insider file pic, September 18, 2014.
Padang Serai MP N. Surendran has joined Universiti Malaya law professor Dr Azmi Sharom in challenging the constitutionality of the Sedition Act under which both are facing charges.
His lawyer, Latheefa Koya, said an application filed today to refer the matter before a High Court will be heard in the Sessions Court on October 14.
"We have filed the application under Section 30 of the Courts of Judicature Act 1964 for the Sessions Court to refer this matter to a High Court as constitutional issues will be raised," she told The Malaysian Insider.
In the application, Surendran said the Sedition Act 1948 was not passed by Parliament as none had existed during the British rule.
"Only a legislature can pass laws to restrict the freedom of speech and expression under Article 10 of the Federal Constitution," he said.
Therefore, he said the sedition law was ultra vires the supreme law of the land.
Surendran, who is also a lawyer, said the Court of Appeal in acquitting Seri Setia assemblyman Nik Nazmi Nik Ahmad for organising a gathering under the Peaceful Assembly Act 2012, had established a legal principle that a person cannot be punished for breaching basic rights.
He said the appellate court had ruled that law enforcement agencies could only regularise basic freedoms.
"They can come up with guidelines but cannot impose punishment," he said.
Surendran said many provisions in the Sedition Act deprived an accused person of a fair trial and equal protection under the law.
"This again violates the rights of the accused person under Articles 5 and 8," he said.
Surendran was charged with sedition at the Sessions Court in Kuala Lumpur on August 19, following a press release he had issued titled “Fitnah II is flawed, defensive and insupportable” on April 14, 2014.
The press release was in relation to his client and PKR de facto leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim's appeal against a sodomy conviction.
Yesterday, Azmi filed a similar application to challenge his charge framed under the colonial-era law.
Azmi, a law lecturer with Universiti Malaya, was charged on September 2 under Section 4(1)(b) and Section 4(1)(c) of the Act over his comments in a news article headlined “Take Perak crisis route for speedy end to Selangor impasse, Pakatan told”.
If convicted under either charge, he will face a maximum fine of RM5,000 or jail up to three years, or both.
Surendran and Azmi are among several people recently hauled up in Putrajaya’s sedition dragnet, including opposition leaders, a journalist, activists and two ulama.
Shah Alam MP Khalid Samad (PAS), Seri Delima assemblyman R.S.N. Rayer (DAP), Seputeh MP Teresa Kok (DAP) and Batu MP Tian Chua have also been charged with sedition.
Sabah politician David Orok was prosecuted under the same law on September 3 for allegedly insulting Islam and Prophet Muhammad on Facebook two months ago.
Three days later, activist Ali Abd Jalil pleaded not guilty in the Selayang Sessions Court to a sedition charge for allegedly belittling the Johor Sultanate on Facebook in January and calling for the state's royal institution to be abolished.
He was re-arrested on the same day under the same law after posting bail, for allegedly insulting the Sultan of Selangor on Facebook in August.
On September 5, Muhammad Safwan Anang, a former chairman of Solidariti Mahasiswa Malaysia, was found guilty of sedition and sentenced to 10 months’ jail over a speech delivered on May 13 last year.
Five days later, Muslim preacher Wan Ji Wan Hussin claimed trial to a sedition charge for having allegedly insulted the Sultan of Selangor in a Facebook post in November.
- TMI
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