Stop persecuting opposition politicians – Guan Eng

File photo of Kulai MP Teo Nie Ching. The DAP lawmaker is under police investigation for a post she shared on the social media 5 years ago.

KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 14 – The police should best focus their resources on stopping serial custodial deaths instead of intimidating Opposition politicians with meaningless investigations, DAP Secretary-General And Member of Parliament For Bagan Lim Guan Eng said today.

Condemning the sudden probe by the police into a social media post shared by DAP Kulai MP Teo Nie Ching in April 2017, Guan Eng said for an investigation to be carried out 5 years later smacked of double standards and political intimidation against an opposition politician.

In a statement here today, he asked if the police would take similar action against pro-government leaders who made baseless allegations in their Facebook posts and news reports more than 5 years ago?

“The investigation is being conducted under Section 504 of the Penal Code (intentional insult with intent to provoke a breach of the peace) as well as Section 233 of the Communications and Multimedia Act 1998 (improper use of network facilities or network service, etc).

“However, Teo has never been sued for defamation in her private capacity. Teo had only reposted on her official Facebook along with the caption “pertahankan kebebasan berekspresi, kebebasan bersatire” (defend the freedom to express, freedom to be satirical).”

Guan Eng said this was a complete waste of resources which should be focused on preventing police failures such as the serial custodial deaths, the most recent a 63-year old Malay man at the lockup of the Taiping district police headquarters (IPD) in Perak.

He also said it was regrettable that the police were investigating PKR Youth and Muda leaders, who protested against Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) Chief Commissioner Azam Baki in front of MACC headquarters and against PKR Simpang Renggam MP Maszlee Malik for being present during the handing over of the memorandum to an anti-graft agency representative.

–WE