AMBIGA SOCKS IT TO PUTRAJAYA: Your job is to look after citizens, NOT jail them!

KUALA LUMPUR - Malaysians do not want a government bent on throwing its critics behind bars but one that treats each one equally as citizens, Datuk Ambiga Sreenevasan said today, echoing the growing chorus of disapproval against Putrajaya’s ongoing round-up of dissidents under the Sedition Act.

Ambiga, a renowned human rights lawyer and activist, also cried out against parties that she said had been “destroying” the good memories that Malaysians have of their beloved nation.

“We want a government who looks after us, not a government who puts us behind bars for expressing our opinions,” she said in a brief speech at a Malaysia Day picnic here.

The picnic, dubbed “Piknik Rakyat”, was organised by the newly-formed “Negara-Ku” people’s movement, of which Ambiga is a patron.

Some 50 people attended the colourful event, including Negara-Ku Chairman, Zaid Kamaruddin, the group’s steering committee members, Universiti Malaya law lecturer Associate Prof. Dr. Azmi Sharom, activist Haris Ibrahim and renowned Malaysian poet, Datuk A. Samad Said who read two poems detailing Malaysia’s current fractured state.

Some among the group held up placards with the words “Kembalikan Negaraku” (give us our country back) emblazoned on them, while the others relaxed on colourful mats and socialising among themselves.

After Ambiga’s speech, the activist led the crowd to sing the national anthem.

Speaking to Malay Mail Online, picnic participant Khoo Phaik Hong from Petaling Jaya said: “It’s truly the Malaysian spirit that has been lost for decades.”

Angie echoed the positive sentiment, and added that Malaysians have not forgotten their national identities.

“I think we haven’t had a wonderful day in a long time,” said the Bangsar girl, who was also handing out homemade sandwiches to the crowd.

“And I don’t think that we have forgotten the fact that we are Malaysian and we know each other. It’s a revival of the old feeling of friendliness and togetherness, and of being a nation.”

Putrajaya has come under heavy public scrutiny for its ongoing sedition crackdown, which has seen at least 15 anti-government dissidents, opposition politicians, a law professor and a journalist hauled up in the space of one month.

This is despite Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s promise to do away with the repressive Sedition Act 1948 three times in the span of two years, and replace it with a National Harmony Act with the most recent occasion on September 5.

But with growing pressure from conservatives within his own party, Umno, Najib said recently that the government may not repeal the Sedition Act after all, if its replacement laws were inferior.

Defenders of the Sedition Act, primarily pro-establishment conservatives including former prime minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, contend that its removal will open the floodgates of attacks against the Bumiputera, Islam, and the Malay rulers in the absence of another pre-independence law that has since been repealed, the Internal Security Act. -Malay Mail