Guards (holding up cellphone countdown timer) from UKM warning the students that they have 10 minutes to vacate the event venue

Law academic Dr. Azmi Sharom was chased out by UKM campus authorities after being invited to officiate an anti-sedition act movement in Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM) last night.

After being asked to leave before delivering his speech, Dr Azmi Sharom and the crowd were forced to move to the UKM KTM train station.

His speech was part of the Gerakan Mansuhkan Akta Hasutan (Abolish the Sedition Act Movement) UKM launch, where Azmi as a victim of the Sedition Act himself, was invited to share his ideas and experience with the law faculty of UKM.

During his trial, Azmi had challenged the constitutionality of the Sedition Act 1948 prompting Sessions Court Judge Rashid Hussain to grant leave for the case to be examined by the High Court.

However, he was stopped from speaking last night by the university administration who asked that the hundreds of attendees leave the Pusanika building premises last night.

The President of the Gabungan Mahasiswa UKM Abdul Kahar Bin Hamzah expressed disappointment with the university for what he called an act of provocation.

“Students were asked to end the event via provocation; some of them were aggressively chased out by the university’s pihak keselamatan [campus police].

The organisers were forced to reconvene at the KTM station, 30 minutes walk away, where Azmi gave a short speech before complying to police’s request to disperse

“We were forced to shift our venue to UKM’s KTM station, outside campus. Students walked for more than 30 minutes to reach the station,” he said, adding that the Pusat Aktiviti Pelajar (Pusanika) is an area where students organized various activities in the university.

He said that students should have the right to practice democracy and to express their opinion on current issues.

Despite encountering the police at the parking lot of the KTM station midway through Azmi’s speech, he was allowed to say a few words before being asked to leave once again. The police said that a public assembly such as this needed approval from authorities and failure to do so would be against the law.

Opposition leaders and some academicians believe that the Act has been used to silence dissenting voices and zero down on Pakatan Rakyat leaders and activists.

Dr Aziz Bari, a lecturer from UNISEL was the latest academician to be hauled by the sedition dragnet, who is also the second academic in the history of Malaysia to be accused of sedition under the Act. Both Aziz and Azmi’s comments on the monarch’s constitutional powers with respect to state affairs were regarded as “seditious” under the Act. -The Rocket