The Teoh Beng Hock Association for Democratic Advancement (TBH-ADA) and the Youth Section of KL & Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall condemn the police for invoking Section 505(b) of the Penal Code (statements conducing to public mischief) and Section 233 of the Communications and Multimedia Act 1998 (improper use of network facilities) to investigate University of Malaya New Youth\u2019s call to \u201cabolish the matriculation programme\u201d and for summoning its president, Tang Yi Ze, to give a statement.<\/p>\n
As a university student organisation concerned with the nation\u2019s well-being and committed to reform, UMANY has long spoken publicly on political, economic, cultural and educational issues in Malaysia. This reflects the youth\u2019s concern for national affairs and represents one of the best ways of contributing to the country through constructive discourse. Political leaders should welcome young people\u2019s free discussion on the merits and flaws of education policies, upholding the spirit of free expression and embracing criticism and policy proposals\u2014instead of silencing dissent through repressive measures.<\/p>\n
The police, in their statement, claimed that UMANY\u2019s declaration \u201cmay create negative perceptions of the education system, and trigger dissatisfaction and public panic.\u201d This is a baseless accusation. If the police resort to draconian laws merely on the basis of malicious reports from a few individuals to target student leaders, this will undoubtedly fuel mob politics and infringe upon the constitutionally guaranteed right of free expression.<\/p>\n
We remind the \u201cMADANI\u201d government that when Pakatan Harapan leaders were in opposition, they openly called for the abolition of the Universities and University Colleges Act, the repeal of the Sedition Act, and condemned the Barisan Nasional government\u2019s suppression of student organisations. Many advocates of the single-stream education system also frequently call for the abolition of multilingual stream schools. Do they not equally \u201ccreate negative perceptions of the education system\u201d and cause \u201cdissatisfaction and panic\u201d? The \u201cMADANI\u201d government must not apply double standards by singling out powerless students for punishment.<\/p>\n
It is deeply ironic that Anwar Ibrahim\u2014once a student leader himself\u2014has, after becoming Prime Minister, allowed state apparatuses to suppress students\u2019 freedom of expression. We urge Anwar\u2019s MADANI government to pull back from the brink, stop harassing UMANY leaders, and restore to students the space to speak, to propose, and to criticise freely!<\/p>\n
Ng Yap Hwa, Chairperson of Teoh Beng Hock Association of Democratic Advancement
\nWong Yan Ke, Chief of the Youth Section of KL & Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Teoh Beng Hock Association for Democratic Advancement (TBH-ADA) and the Youth Section of KL & Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall condemn the police for invoking Section 505(b) of the Penal Code (statements conducing to public mischief) and Section 233 of the Communications and Multimedia Act 1998 (improper use of network facilities) to investigate University of Malaya New Youth\u2019s call to \u201cabolish the matriculation programme\u201d and for summoning its president, Tang Yi Ze, to give a statement. As a university student organisation concerned with the nation\u2019s well-being and committed to reform, UMANY has long spoken publicly on political, economic, cultural and educational issues in Malaysia. This reflects the youth\u2019s concern for national affairs and represents one of the best ways of contributing to the country through constructive discourse. Political leaders should welcome young people\u2019s free discussion on the merits and flaws of education policies, upholding the spirit of free expression and […]\n","protected":false},"author":670,"featured_media":41456,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[260,204,164,240,196],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-41449","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-joint-statements","category-statement-youth","category-statements-announcements","category-statements-of-committess","category-youth"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/klscah.org.my\/wp-content\/uploads\/TBH-ADA-\u9a6c\u5927\u6587\u544a\u56fe-EN.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/klscah.org.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41449"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/klscah.org.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/klscah.org.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/klscah.org.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/670"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/klscah.org.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41449"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/klscah.org.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41449\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":41459,"href":"https:\/\/klscah.org.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41449\/revisions\/41459"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/klscah.org.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41456"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/klscah.org.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41449"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/klscah.org.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41449"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/klscah.org.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41449"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}