Anti-terrorism law restrains human rights, says Wong Chen

KUALA LUMPUR: Opposition Members of Parliament say the new anti-terrorism law restrains fundamental liberties and may be misused or abused to punish individuals, in a similar way to the abolished Internal Security Act (ISA).
Referring to the power given to the special inquiry officer, who can detain a person suspected to have engaged or be involved in terrorism activities and the indefinite detention without trial which cannot be reviewed, Wong Chen (PKR-Kelana Jaya) said these are serious threats to the people's fundamental liberties.
"Section 13(1)(b) of the Prevention of Terrorism Bill allows the inquiry officer to detain a suspect for two years. Section 17(5) states that these two years can be renewed indefinitely every two years and Section 19 says (there will be) no judicial review or habeas corpus.P3
"These are severe restrictions of civil liberties the law. We see this as a threat to the very fragile fundamental liberties that we have in this country," he told a press conference at Parliament lobby today.
Wong Chen stressed that the government should give sufficient time to scrutinise and debate the bill and all the other bills tabled by the Home Ministry today.
"We only have a week to prepare for these six bills. It is completely unfair and not appropriate for such an important bill to be given such a short time.
"This legislation could be the biggest Bill this year," he said.
Wong Chen said that the definition of "terrorist acts" is detailed in a different Act hence there is risk of it being wrongly used.
He said this is despite having a clause that states that no person shall be arrested solely for his political belief or political activity.
"They say if you belong to a political party, registered under the Registrar of Societies (RoS), then you are safe. But is it really true (that) you are safe? I don't think so," he said.