POLICE have arrested 10 suspects linked to the fracas at Sunday’s Nothing To Hide forum in Shah Alam, and are now zooming in the persons who orchestrated the incident.

Initial investigations have revealed that several youths were paid RM50  each to cause a ruckus at the event by lighting flares and throwing shoes at the stage when Pakatan Harapan chairman Dr Mahathir Mohamad was speaking.

Chairs were also flung at the crowd.

The Malaysian Insight learnt that following the arrests of three youths at the scene on Sunday, Selangor police have gone as far as Kangar, Perlis to nab others in follow-up operations.

“One was picked up in Kangar while six others were picked up at various locations in the Klang Valley yesterday,” a source told The Malaysian Insight.

The seven are aged between 20 and 30. The three youths who were first to be arrested are aged 17, 18, and 19.

Selangor CID chief Assistant Commissioner Fadzil Ahmat last night confirmed they had 10 suspects in custody.

“We are not only looking for the troublemakers but also those behind these youths. That is part of the investigations,” Fadzil told The Malaysian Insight. 

It is understood that police have seized the suspects’ handphones.

The 10 are being investigated under the Peaceful Assembly Act, Corrosive and Explosive Substances and Offensive Weapons Act as well as for rioting.

Pakatan leaders have blamed Umno for the incident while the prime minister’s aide Tengku Sarifuddin Tengku Ahmad said Dr Mahathir was the cause of the fracas

Sarifuddin and PAS president Abdul Hadi Awang said Dr Mahathir’s supporters had become angry when the former prime minister could not answer questions on the scandals that had occurred during his administration.

Registered Malay Voters association deputy president Nazilah Idris said the suspects, who were students, were the real victims in the affair as they had obviously been used.

Nazilah urged police to find the culprit who had taken advantage of and used the students to create chaos at an event organised by the opposition.

“They are innocent. The mastermind is the person that police should be going after,” she said.

She said the information available so far showed that the students were promised RM50 each to attend the event and a bonus if they created chaos. – August 16, 2017.