Breaking News: RPK to be charged with Sedition
Technorati tags: RPK, Raja Petra Kamaruddin, Sedition, Altantuya
Updated @ 0043hrs May 6th - The update can be found in the full post...
Original Post:
About 30 minutes or so ago, Walski got an SMS from fellow blogger Shar101.
Raja Petra Kamaruddin, popularly known as RPK, webmaster of Malaysia Today, will be charged in court tomorrow for sedition. Haris Ibrahim will be part of his defense team.
From The People's Parliament:
Just spoke to RPK and wife.
He’s been directed by the police to be at the Kuala Lumpur Court Complex, Jalan Duta tomorrow morning 9.30am where he will be charged under the Sedition Act.
I will be there.
(source: The People's Parliament)
As was widely reported, RPK was called in for questioning by the police last Friday, May 2nd, over his April 25th article “Let's send the Altantuya murderers to hell”. RPK reportedly refused to give any statement, stating that it was "political persecution".
(what Sedition is, and more updates, in the full post)
Walski will update this post momentarily, and will include what the legal definition of sedition is, per the Sedition Act 1948. It's just that this post needs to go out - pronto! More later, kiddies...
Update @ 0043hrs, May 6th:
Wikipedia has a whole host of information pertaining to Malaysian Sedition Laws, enforced via the Sedition Act (1948). As Walski had postulated in an earlier post, this comes under Walski's Third Law of Governmental Physics: "For every civil liberty guaranteed in the Federal Constitution, there is an equal and opposite law enacted to totally negate it".
In fact, the Federal Constitution itself opens up a loophole (via Article 10) to allow laws to be enacted to purposely circumvent the civil liberties it guarantees. Nice, huh? It's just like owning a bicycle, but being disallowed to pump its tires with air.
So, what exactly constitues being Seditious? According to Section 3(1) of the Sedition Act, actions that are deemed seditious are those that have a tendency to:
- to bring into hatred or contempt or to excite disaffection against any Ruler or against any Government;
- to excite the subjects of the Ruler or the inhabitants of any territory governed by any government to attempt to procure in the territory of the Ruler or governed by the Government, the alteration, otherwise than by lawful means, of any matter as by law established;
- to bring into hatred or contempt or to excite disaffection against the administration of justice in Malaysia or in any State;
- to raise discontent or disaffection amongst the subjects of the Yang di-Pertuan Agong or of the Ruler of any State or amongst the inhabitants of Malaysia or of any State;
- to promote feelings of ill-will and hostility between different races or classes of the population of Malaysia; or
- to question any matter, right, status, position, privilege, sovereignty or prerogative established or protected by the provisions of part III of the Federal constitution or Article 152, 153 or 181 of the Federal Constitution
The above information has been taken from Wikipedia, where you can read more about the provisions of this act - a dastardly relic from our colonial days. Anyone found guilty can be sentenced to 3 years in prison, or fined RM 5,000. Or both.
Malaysiakini was the first Malaysian news agency to report on RPK's day in court tomorrow, publishing the following report at about 10:02pm, earlier on.
Uncle Zorro, incidentally, has issued the battle-cry... and has called on all those concerned to walk with RPK tomorrow (in not so many words). Walski can't be there, unfortunately, but will be keeping a close eye on the developments, and will post what he finds out accordingly.
Walski prays that RPK prevails this latest assault on his unrelenting voice. Sedition is one of those all-encompasing dragnet laws that are frequently used to silence political opposition in this country. In this case, it is the attempt to silence one individual. But the voice of that one individual has travelled far and wide, and Walski thinks, to an extent, that voice has had a viral influence in how the Malaysian political and public opinion landscapes have changed.
With an expected power-house defense team, though, God-willing, Walski is quite confident that RPK will prevail...
