Above the Law: The Immunity of "Law Abiding" Civil Society Movement in Malaysia

Last year I wrote about Bersih 2.0 in The Anatomy of A High Risk Contentious Performance: Evaluating the Ninth of July to provide a framework of looking at Street demonstrations. I even got quoted by BERNAMA for it (here)...layan

Malaysia moved on from that event, we got the Peaceful Assembly Act and the PSC on The Electoral Reform but BERSIH remain Keling Kampung style agent provocateurs.

City Hall says no, Bersih 3.0 to go ahead April 20, 2012 KUALA LUMPUR, April 20 — Bersih 2.0 chairman Datuk Ambiga Sreenevasan said the electoral sit-down protest at Dataran Merdeka next Saturday will go ahead as planned despite Kuala Lumpur City Hall’s rejection of its request. “We are going to go ahead with it anyway,” she told reporters at a press conference today. Fellow Bersih 2.0 steering committee member Maria Chin Abdullah said it received this morning City Hall’s letter rejecting its request to hold the event at the historic square on April 28. File photo of Ambiga (second from right) and other Bersih leaders earlier this month in Kuala Lumpur when they announced the date of the sit-down protest. — “It was a one-paragraph statement saying that our event was not suitable with the use of Dataran Merdeka. “It said: ‘Dataran Merdeka untuk acara yang bertahap nasional. Contohnya, Hari Kebangsaan dan Hari Wilayah Persekutuan dan acara yang setaraf dengannya’,” she told The Malaysian Insider when contacted. Chin said the letter was signed by a Datuk Normah Malik, deputy director of management at City Hall. more here

To be honest I think Datuk Normah Malik may have overlooked some of the provisions in the Peaceful Assembly Act.


From a very strict interpretation of the Act I don't even think that Acara bertahap nasional can be conducted at Dataran Merdeka anymore

Source here

Let us look at the location of the "place of assembly" of BERSIH 3.0

 Can someone go get a tape measure and calculate the distance of Dataran Merdeka from St Mary and see if it is within the 50 meters boundary.

So will Ambiga be a good citizen of Malaysia and for once try to follow the rules and regulation of this beloved country.

Find another location la Amma...you got 8 days

I still wonder why Ambiga seems to get everything that she wants.....is this what Civil Society movement is all about?

UPDATE 341am 22April

Guess what folks...a comment came in to say that Act is NOT IN FORCE

Monkey searched n validated

Even Hishamudin said so

Although Home Minister Hishammuddin Hussein gave the green light to Bersih’s rally last week, he refrained from doing the same for Himpunan’s protest, saying that street protests were not allowed under the newly passed Peaceful Assembly Act (PAA). The PAA has yet to be gazetted but Hishammuddin said that the spirit of the law is in force. here

In Spirit biar betik pakcik