A SCREENING of the documentary “She’s in Jail” hosted by by Johor Yellow Flame on March 30 was cancelled when Home Ministry and police officers showed up.

The event coordinator Lee Chen Kang was taken away for investigation on the grounds that the film had not been approved by the Film Censorship Board (LPF). It’s worth noting that the same film has already been shown in Kuala Lumpur and Ipoh.

Film screenings of similar nature happen all the time and organisers don’t always submit the films beforehand to the LPF. It appears that the Home Ministry is practising selective law enforcement.

In 2014, the Freedom Film Fest screened “To Singapore, with Love”, a documentary about former activists, student leaders, and communists who fled Singapore in the 1960’s, 1970’s and 1980′s.

The screening was successful and well received in Johor Baru, where hundreds of Singaporeans flocked to see the film which had been banned back in homeland. However, the scheduled screening in Kuantan the following month was thwarted.

Home Ministry officers visited the venue owner three times, threatened to revoke their business licence and eventually forced the organiser, Pusat Komas to cancel the event.

A year before this incident, Pusat Komas also faced protest from the Sri Lankan Embassy for screening “No Fire Zone: The Killing Fields of Sri Lanka”, a film about Sri Lanka’s 26-year civil war that killed tens of thousands of people. It holds the government accountable for the massacres and various other crimes such as summary executions, torture, and sexual assaults.

The Pusat Komas programme coordinator, Lena Hendry, was sentenced to pay a RM10,000 fine or spend a year in jail for violating Section 6(1) of the Film Censorship Act, which forbids the possession, circulation, distribution, display, production, sale, or rental of any film or film-publicity material without the permission of the censorship board.

The same law, which is highly unrealistic in the digital age, was invoked to prevent the screening of “She’s in Jail” in Johor Baru and to interrogate Lee Chen Kang.

The Film Censorship Act is outdated and can easily be used as a tool to restrict media freedom.

What’s more, prior approval from the censors is no guarantee that a film will be released. “The New Village” is a local film that had been approved for release, but the trailer caused an uproar in social media.

Before seeing the film, Malaysians had simply concluded that it glorified communism and distorted the May 13 incident. The then home minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi intervened and had the film re-evaluated by the censors again. Eventually, the film was banned.

On the other hand, “Mentega Terbang” was removed from the streaming service Viu after two years, even though the film was outside the jurisdiction of LPF.

Not only did the Home Ministry ban the screening and publicity of the film, Communications and Digital Minister Fahmi Fadzil also blamed the previous government for approving such a film.

The film’s producer and director have been accused of hurting religious feelings and even received death threats.

The Home Ministry is clearly selective in film screening approvals. Complaints, political pressure, or public outcry will colour its judgement.

Films that are speculated to undermine the legitimacy of the regime or are suspected of violating a particular ideology become easy targets. A film can be banned because of political influence or because it’s offensive to some exclusivists.

It doesn’t matter whether LPF has approved it or if it’s out of their jurisdiction. With the rise of online and offline vigilantism, the innocents are often targeted. It is imperative that we review the existing system to ensure that it doesn’t give in to senseless clamour and doesn’t become a tool of repression.

We are not sure whose feathers are ruffled by the screening of “She’s in Jail”, a documentary about Chow Hang-tung, a Hong Kong barrister, democracy activist, and a human rights champion who has been in prison since 2021 due to her leadership of Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China and her organisation of activities to commemorate the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre.

It’s a film that will resonate with Malaysians who have lived through Reformasi and the Bersih movement. Malaysia is more fortunate than Hong Kong in that our vote is real and meaningful, and we have moved away from one-party rule. However, various forms of social control still exist.

The Madani government has already shown us an unprecedented wave of censorship (see “Censorship under the Madani govt”).

Deploying 13 law-enforcement officers to deal with a film screening is like cracking a nut with a sledgehammer. While the examples above may reflect repression elsewhere, Malaysia does not have to follow suit.

Our neighbour Indonesia has already demonstrated a far more advanced film culture and creative mindset than ours (see “Indonesia films confront authoritarian legacy”).

Freedom to show films is a sign of an enlightened society. – April 8, 2024.

* Veronica Lim Yi Hui is the Agora Society chairman. She holds a degree in biochemistry and is a PhD candidate in Philosophy. She has great interest in human creative endeavours like films and music. At the same time, she is concerned over the destructive impact of humans on the planet.