November 28, 2011
Open Letter from President, Malaysian Bar Council to Members of Parliament
"The Malaysian Bar is unaffected that any try to umpire a elemental autocracy upon trial under a Federal Constitution contingency usually be finished after due consultation with all stakeholders, together with antithesis parliamentarians as well as civil multitude groups."Lim Chee Wee
Dear Wakil Rakyat,
You might have listened that a Malaysian Bar opposes the Peaceful Assembly Bill 2011 ("PA 2011") upon a drift that it imposes unreasonable as well as jagged fetters upon a leisure of public that is upon trial under a Federal Constitution.
There have been supplies in PA 2011 that have been distant some-more restrictive than a stream law, such as a banning of "street protests" (assemblies in suit or processions) as well as a total powers vested in a military to dictate a time, date, place as well as control of an assembly.
There have been additionally supplies in PA 2011 that have been simply illogical. As an example, nonetheless military do not need to be told of a eremite assembly, such an public cannot be reason at a place of worship.
Furthermore, a chairman vital within 50 metres of a kindergarten or propagandize cannot reason an open residence for a festival, a funeral way or a wedding reception.
The Prime Minister, in his Malaysia Day speech upon September 15, 2011, betrothed a Rakyat of a following:
I mostly opine that long gone is a epoch in that a government knows all as well as claims corner over wisdom. . . .
The government will additionally examination Section 27 of a Police Act 1967, receiving in to care Art! icle 10 of a Federal Constitution per leisure of public as well as so as to be in line with international norms upon a same matter. . . . (emphasis added)
Be confident that it is a strength as well as not a weakness for us to place a trust in a Malaysian people's intelligence to have decisions that will figure a path of their own future. . . .
It is absolutely clear that a steps we only voiced have been none pick than early initiatives of an organised as well as seemly domestic transformation.
It stands as a crucial as well as most indispensable element to a initiatives of economic mutation as well as public presentation that a government has outlined as well as implemented for over dual years in a bid to colonize a modern as well as on-going nation. . . .
In closing, we wish to emphasize that giveaway of any guess as well as doubt, a Malaysia that we all dream of as well as have been in a process of formulating is a Malaysia that practices [sic] a organic as well as thorough democracy where public assent as well as wealth is preserved in accordance with a leverage of a constitution, sequence of law as well as apply oneself for simple human rights as well as particular rights.
'Outrageous to demarcate processions'
PA 2011 is neither unchanging with "international norms", nor "in accordance with a leverage of a Constitution, sequence of law as well as apply oneself for simple human rights as well as particular rights". 
Instead, a Bill will take us further away from being "a modern as well as on-going nation".
It is outrageous that assemblies in suit have been prohibite! d. Assem blies in suit yield a demonstrators with a wider audience as well as larger visibility, in sequence for others to see as well as hear a means or grievance giving climb to a gathering.
Assemblies in suit has been described as "a manly method of expression as well as is a usual phenomenon in democratic societies"[1].
History is replete with pacific assemblies in motion, that were agents of change as well as of good.
Processions led to nation's founding
On February 27, 1946 Onn Jaafar, initial father of UMNO as well as a grandfather of a benefaction Minister for Home Affairs, led a way of 15,000 people to protest a investiture of a Malayan Union, that disregarded a interests of a Malay Rulers as well as a Malays.
This was a initial of a array of processions that successfully against a Malayan Union, as well as later led to a nation's independence.
On February 27, 2008, a then-Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi led 20,000 people in a one-kilometre way from a Batu Pahat UMNO bureau to a stadium to commemorate this rally.
There have been pick processions calling for a abolition of a Internal Security Act 1960, rights of minorities as well as electoral reforms.
For a Malaysian Bar, we organised a Walk for Justice, that was reason upon September 26, 2007, to call for a royal elect to examine a VK Lingam video clip as well as a investiture of a Judicial Appointments Commission, both of that were subsequently set up by a government.
The benefaction prohibition of way robs a rakyat of a right that currently exists under Section 27 of a Police Act, that regulates "assemblies, meetings as well as processions".
Elsewhere, histo! ry is fu ll of various pacific processions led by Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr as well as Nelson Mandela, to name though a few, that brought an finish to oppressive laws, policies as well as regimes.
It is mocking that a government right away wants to demarcate a really processions that led to a initial of a nation, as well as others that changed a budding apportion to promise legislative reforms.
These betrothed reforms right away strike behind at a really demonstrations that catalysed them.The Malaysian Bar is indifferent in a stand as well as determination that PA 2011, in a stream form, contingency not turn law.
The Malaysian Bar is unaffected that any try to umpire a elemental autocracy upon trial under a Federal Constitution contingency usually be finished after due consultation with all stakeholders, together with antithesis parliamentarians as well as civil multitude groups.
No Other Choice
To this end, a Malaysian Bar has due an pick check to be considered, as well as calls for PA 2011 to be remitted to a parliamentary name committee for consideration.
At a second celebration of a mass of PA 2011, we ask that you, as a wakil rakyat, support a call.
It is not an exaggeration to say that tomorrow, we will reason a autocracy of a rakyat in your hands. We ask that we treat it with a deference it deserves.
Now, some-more than ever, we contingency remember that we were inaugurated as a representative of a people, to lift out responsibilities as a 'wakil rakyat'.
Please do not put blind tractability to celebration as well as partisanship prior to your duties as a menial of a people. The rakyat should not be done to humour a consequences of celebration politics. PA 2011 is an unjust law, being done in undue haste, that has perceived a condemnati! on of a Rakyat.
There can be no pick choice.
Do not pass PA 2011. Support a pick check as well as a call for a Parliamentary Select Committee.
Yours faithfully,
Lim Chee Wee
President
Malaysian Bar
[1] Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal in Leung Kwok Hung & Ors v Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (FACC Nos. 1 & 2 of 2005, at para. 3).
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