Ganabatirau/Kengadharan still “unfree†after ISA release
lthough Hindraf leaders V.Ganabatirau and R. Kengadharan have been released from Internal Security Act detention after 15 months 23 days – 46 hours after the new PM’s announcement – and have returned home to their families in Shah Alam and Petaling Jaya respectively, they remain “unfree Malaysians” with the host of draconian and undemocratic restrictions imposed on their ISA release.
Instead of full and unconditional release from ISA, Ganabatirau and Kengadharan remain unfree, exchanging incarceration within the four walls of the Kamunting Detention Centre for an invisible incarceration without walls but equally repressive and undemocratic in depriving them of their fundamental rights as Malaysian citizens and the human rights entrenched in the Malaysian Constitution.
The undemocratic and draconian conditions for the release of the Hindraf duo denied them human rights and fundamental liberties in substance, time and space, depriving them of the citizenship rights to take part in political and public activities, the human rights of freedoms of speech and expression, as well as requiring them to report regularly to the police as if they are big-time criminals.
