THE abuse of the Sedition Act 1948 for political purposes was more prevalent last year, said human rights group Suara Rakyat Malaysia (Suaram).

Suaram data revealed the number of cases under the Sedition Act 1948 in 2020 was 24, double the figures in 2019.

These were cases that were investigated, people were charged with and even those found guilty, executive director Sevan Doraisamy said at the launch of its Human Rights Report 2020.

The 24 cases were also the highest in five previous years. Suaram’s statistics showed 10 cases in 2018, 11 (2017) and 15 (2016).

“The government has failed to discard repressive laws, sending Malaysia on a downward spiral for freedom of expression,” Sevan said.

The Pakatan Harapan (PH) government, which came into power in 2018 had promised to review and abolish draconian detention laws and the Sedition Act 1948 was one of them.

“All this did not come to pass,” Sevan said at the event held at the Kuala Lumpur and Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall that was broadcast live online.

“The slew of reform promises in their (PH) 2018 election manifesto was either ignored or discarded.

“And the administration even reactivated the use of detention without trial laws by the end of its rule in February 2020.

“Its successor, the Perikatan Nasional (PN) government, did not reverse the trend and has continued to use the same repressive laws,” he said.

In fact, further statistics has clearly revealed that PN was less willing to tolerate dissent and did not hesitate to utilise repressive laws to curtail and deter public criticism, Sevan said.

“Suaram has documented a total of 98 cases that were either arrested, investigated, charged or found guilty under Section 233 of Communications and Multimedia Act 1998.

“There was a drastic increase in the application of the Act against speeches that touched on race, religion and royalty and fake news related to Covid-19 on the internet,” he said.

Security laws permitting detention without trial also continued to be abused throughout 2020, he said.

“The pandemic and movement restrictions did not slow down the use of such laws, often justified on grounds of ‘crime prevention’.”

Suaram documented a total of 828 uses of Security Offences (Special Measures) Act 2012 (Sosma) cases and a total of 667 uses of Prevention of Crime Act 1959 (Poca) in the past year.

“Sosma was used more often than previous years for cases mostly related to human trafficking. Poca was another repressive law used extensively to combat organised crime,” Sevan said. 

For charges in relation to peaceful assemblies, Suaram said 2020 had the lowest number at 25 individuals, compared with 47 individuals in 2019, 73 in 2018, 140 (2017) and 49 (2016). 

But this was natural because of the implementation of the movement-control order that disallowed gatherings to curb the Covid-19 pandemic, Sevan said. 

“The Prevention and Control of Infectious Diseases (Measures within Infected Local Areas) Regulations 2020 were also used against any kind of assembly during the period of the pandemic.”

Aside from that, the report also agreed that the plight of migrant workers in Malaysia was accentuated and that the LGBTIQ community remained a discriminated community. 

“Deaths in custody, chain remand and police shootings continued to happen with no accountability or oversight,” he added.

“Suaram has also documented cases where developers with the assistance of federal or state governments have acquired lands through high-handed methods from the indigenous community.”

The pandemic in 2020 showed some of the worst cases of human rights violations in Malaysia while the whole county has been in lockdown, the report concluded. – May 4, 2021.