EVEN at the tail end of the campaigning period, Pakatan Harapan’s Seri Delima candidate Syerleena Abdul Rashid of DAP continues to face personal attacks and slander.

New banners accusing her of attacking Islam and attempting to change the country’s official religion to Christianity has since surfaced around the state constituency, with one banner even carrying two quotes attributed to her.

One read: “Saya bersumpah akan menyerang institusi Islam khususnya Jakim demi DAP (I swear to attack the institution of Islam especially the Islamic Development Department for DAP).”

The other quote on the same banner read: “Saya akan berjuang agama rasmi Malaysia akan ditukarkan kepada Kristian agama rasmi Malaysia selepas PRU14 (I will fight for the official religion to be changed to Christianity after GE14).”

“I was this morning informed of these banners accusing me of having an agenda to change the official religion. I never made such statements.

“Some people are trying to tarnish my image because I represent DAP, and hurt my position because I am a woman candidate in this election,” she said at the Bukit Gelugor PH operations centre in Seri Delima this afternoon.

Syerleena, 38, a former Penang Island City councillor and DAP’s first Malay woman candidate in the state, said this was the fifth time she had called a press conference to highlight the slander, attacks and threats made against her and her campaign team members.

Before the campaigning period, a WhatsApp message questioning her candidacy had spread. She was also accused of wanting to topple Jakim and install a Christian government.

Last week, a PH ceramah in Taman Tun Sardon in Seri Delima was disrupted by several individuals and one of her campaign team members was threatened by an unknown person when he was on his way home.

Syerleena said she was facing personal attacks because she was a Malay woman in DAP.

“They are using the same ‘template’ and labels to attack me. They are also making an issue of me not wearing tudung (headscarf).”

Another banner that surfaced read: “Bagaimana DAP mengaburi rakyat? (How does DAP deceive the people?” with a picture of Syerleena wearing a headscarf in the company of Malays, and another of her without a headscarf in a Chinese crowd below.

“I was also told by a Seri Delima resident that people were discussing my sexuality and speculating over whether I was straight or not,” Syerleena said, adding that even caretaker women’s exco Chong Eng and state agency Penang Women’s Development Corporation suffered attacks by unknown detractors using the LBGT (lesbian, bisexual, gay, transgender) label.

“These attacks are not productive. It shows that the culprits don’t understand what the important issues affecting the people are,” she said.

Five police reports have been filed by Syerleena’s team over the attacks, including over the latest banners, which have since been removed by the Election Commission (EC).

Incumbent Bukit Gelugor MP Ramkarpal Singh said the fact that EC had removed the banners proved they were defamatory.

“Those behind them could be charged for slander and spreading fake news under the new Anti-Fake News Act. If the EC removed the banners, it proves prima facie.

“The attacks are old and recycled tactics because no action had previously been taken by the authorities. This has caused such an outcome,” he said in urging the police to investigate Syerleena’s reports. – May 7, 2018.