KUALA LUMPUR – Police have received 12 reports against Umno president Datuk Seri Ahmad Zahid Hamidi over his speech at a special party briefing last Saturday.
Royal Malaysia Police corporate communications chief Skandaguru Anandan said investigations will be handled by the Classified Crimes Investigation Unit, or D5, under Bukit Aman’s Criminal Investigations Department.
“Investigations into the 12 reports will be under Section 4(1) of the Sedition Act 1948 and Section 233 of the Communications and Multimedia Act 1998,” he said in a press statement today, as reported by Getaran, The Vibes’ Bahasa Malaysia sister portal.
These sections of the law pertain respectively to committing an act or uttering words that have a seditious tendency, and to using a network or service application to communicate obscene, false, menacing, or offensive content.
Among other things, Zahid had questioned at the Umno gathering on Saturday if former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak had received a fair trial, following the Federal Court’s decision to uphold his conviction and sentence in the SRC International Sdn Bhd case.
The party’s special briefing was convened to rally Umno members and to show their solidarity with Najib following his jailing last Tuesday after he failed in his final appeal to overturn his conviction.
Zahid also denied that Umno’s call for early elections was a means for him to escape his criminal charges.
Among those who had lodged police reports against Zahid were members of Pakatan Harapan component party Amanah, and Bersatu, which is part of Perikatan Nasional.
Amanah mobilisation bureau chief Mohd Sany Hamzan lodged his report against Zahid yesterday at the Dang Wangi district police station, alleging that the Umno president had insulted and slandered the judiciary, the Attorney-General’s Chambers, and other institutions including the Yang Di-Pertuan Agong over Najib’s case.
Bersatu Youth information chief Mohd Ashraf Mustaqim Badrul Munir had also lodged a police report against Zahid at Dang Wangi as well.
Ashraf said Zahid’s statements, which questioned the judicial system’s ability to hold a fair trial, had mocked and slandered the country’s institutions and were “dangerous” as they could incite people not to trust those institutions. – The Vibes, August 30, 2022
