Now Zahid says PCA Bill open to changes
(MM) – The controversial proposed amendments to the Prevention of Crime Act (PCA) can still be changed, Datuk Seri Ahmad Zahid Hamidi said today, amid rising criticism against the return of preventive detention.
The Home Minister said Putrajaya was open to making a few amendments at the committee stage after the second reading of the PCA (Amendment and Extension) Bill 2013, but he refused to specify if the clauses allowing detention without trial would be amended.
“Don’t close the door and claim that the government is not willing to listen and have discussions with those who feel that this law is something that must be rejected 100 per cent,” Ahmad Zahid told reporters at Parliament here this afternoon.
The PCA bill has come under fire from Malaysia’s three Bar associations, opposition lawmakers, and human rights activists, who say that the Bill is a resurrection of two colonial-era laws — the Internal Security Act (ISA) and the Emergency Ordinance (EO) — that were repealed by the Najib administration in 2011.
Several PKR lawmakers said later today that they would press for the Bill to be sent to a parliamentary select committee before the second reading.
“If we rush through 11 Bills in three days, the time for debate is too short,” Gombak MP Azmin Ali told reporters here today, referring to other Bills to amend related laws such as the Penal Code, Security Offences (Special Measures) Act, the Criminal Procedure Code and the Evidence Act.
“One bill is very important, but it is taken lightly by the government that is trying to bulldoze this Bill through,” added the PKR deputy president.
Subang MP R. Sivarasa said Putrajaya had also made some amendments to the PCA Bill, such as extending detention under remand to 59 days, before detention without trial for two years.
Putrajaya maintains that preventive detention does not signal a return to the days of the ISA and EO — both of which are said to have been abused to quell dissent — but critics remain adamant in their fears that such a law would lead to a repeat of previous abuses.
Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak said yesterday in New York that preventive detention would be used against violent criminals, not political dissidents.
The PCA Bill was tabled in Parliament last week amid an ongoing crackdown by the police against the criminal underworld, after a recent spate of shootings and violent crime.
