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Fine-tuning needed: Lawyers

Thursday, 24 November 2011 08:41am

©The Sun Daily (Used by permission)
by TAN YI LIANG AND ALYAA ALHADJRI

>New Peaceful Assembly Bill has both improvements and drawbacks

PETALING JAYA: The Peaceful Assembly Bill has some merit, but it needs to be fine-tuned to remove some controversial provisions, according to several lawyers and social activists.

National Young Lawyers committee member Syahredzan Johan said that despite the flaws, the bill has some positive points.

“Once notification has been given to the police, the bill doesn’t say that the police can deny you the right to hold an assembly. They can impose conditions and restrictions, but they cannot deny it,” said Syahredzan, who spoke to theSun in a phone interview yesterday.

He said that under section 27 of the Police Act, the police could ban an assembly outright.

Syahredzan said under section 25(1) and section 9(2) of the bill, the home minister may gazette designated places of assembly.

“Notification is not needed at these places and the police cannot impose any condition or restriction on them. That is good.”

Syahredzan said he would still oppose the bill being passed in its present form due to its weaknesses.He raised the definition of street protests under section 4 of the bill, pointing out that it covers any form of

moving assembly such as those held by the Bersih 2.0 or the Movement to Abolish the ISA.

“I foresee this wide definition being used to curtail certain types of assemblies, and certainly the Bersih type of street protests. For this bill to have any substance, the prohibition against street protests must be

removed,” Syahredzan said.

He said such a prohibition was a step backwards as previously, a permit could be obtained from an OCPD under section 27 of the Police Act. but “now, such rallies are totally banned”.

In the bill, assemblies are prohibited within a 50m radius of a list of buildings, including hospitals, schools, petrol stations and bridges.

Malaysian Centre for Constitutionalism and Human Rights activist Edmund Bon described the list of prohibited places as an unwarranted restriction.

“It means that people cannot protest in front of the Bar Council because you cannot have an assembly within 50m from a prohibited place, and the Bar Council is not even 50m from a bridge.

“When the government speaks of being progressive, its actions don’t follow what it is saying.”

Bon said the definition of an assembly is problematic as it requires private indoor assembly organisers to give prior notice to the police.

He said this requirement is not in the Police Act, which only applies to public events. He calls for the bill to be reviewed by a parliamentary select committee.

Bersih 2.0 chairman Datuk Ambiga Sreenevasan wants the bill to be withdrawn as it lacks redeeming features. “It is an insult to Malaysians to whom a promise of more democracy was made,” Ambiga said, adding that the bill puts Malaysians in a worse position than they are under the Police Act, with the 30-day prior notice no different from applying for a permit.

“They can fine people they arrest, so the police and home minister have more power than they had before.”

Three officials of the Association for the Promotion of Human Rights – Tan Sri Ramon Navaratnam, Datuk Michael Yeoh and Datuk Dr Denison Jayasooria – said in a statement that the second reading of the bill should be delayed to allow a parliamentary select committee to hold consultation with MPs, the Malaysian Human Rights Commission and the public.

Sungai Siput MP Dr Jeyakumar Devaraj of Parti Sosialis Malaysia said the bill will directly infringe on the people’s right to assemble.

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