Gerakan: No need for drastic moves in Ipoh arrests

Written by Yong Min Wei, The Edge

Gerakan has urged the police to exercise restraint and rationality in dealing with those involved in the launch of a three-day hunger strike in Ipoh to call for the dissolution of the Perak state legislative assembly.

Gerakan Youth Chief Lim Si Pin opined that Home Affairs Minister Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein would not agree with the police taking such drastic action to arrest Pakatan Rakyat (PR) elected representatives who wanted to go on hunger strike.
 
"Hunger strike is a form of non-violent protest and police should not intervene. The police action could be construed as a Barisan Nasional-sanctioned action," he said in a statement today.
 
Claiming the police were too obsessed with calming down the situation, Lim said the party was shocked that five workers including three foreigners of an event company engaged to put up a canopy and a giant balloon outside the Perak DAP headquarters were also detained.
 
More than 10 PR politicians and party workers including ousted Perak assembly speaker V Sivakumar, DAP's Ipoh Barat MP M Kulasegaran and state assemblymen Keshwinder Singh (DAP-Malim Nawar), Chan Ming Kai (PKR-Simpang Pulai), Chang Lih Kang (PKR-Teja), Leong Mee Meng (DAP-Jalong), Thomas Su (DAP-Pasir Pinji) and Lim Pek Har (DAP-Menglembu) were arrested earlier today for disobeying police orders to disperse.