By P. Prem Kumar with additional reporting by Michael Hernandez in Washington
KUALA LUMPUR
The daughter of imprisoned Malaysian opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim was arrested Monday evening for sedition after reading her father’s speech in parliament last week.
Nurul Izzah, a parliamentarian and vice-president of Ibrahim’s political party, was detained at the Dang Wangi police station in capital Kuala Lumpur under section 4(1) of the colonial Sedition Act.
She had earlier arrived at the headquarters to give a statement on an illegal March 7 street protest against Ibrahim's imprisonment for allegedly sodomizing his former aide.
Before entering the police station, Izzah told reporters she would be investigated regarding Section 9(5) of the 2012 Peaceful Assembly Act. "I have no idea how long my statement will take," she said.
After an hour, however, she tweeted that she had been taken into custody for alleged sedition.
Her lawyer R. Sivarasa told The Anadolu Agency that Izzah may be held overnight before being released on bail.
"Arrest documentation is being prepared by the police. Now she has been brought to another section of the headquarters for fingerprint and to be photographed," he said in a text message. "Lawyers were not allowed to follow."
In Washington, State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki voiced strong concern over Izzah’s detention.
“The Malaysian government's recent investigations and charges of sedition against critics raise serious concerns about freedom of expression, rule of law, and the independence of the judicial system in Malaysia,” she said. “To further restrict freedom of expression will only lead to further erosion of important pillars of Malaysia's democratic system.”
Last Tuesday, Izzah read her father’s debate address after an application for Ibrahim, 67, to be allowed to attend parliament -- on the grounds that he remains opposition leader -- was rebuffed.
Tian Chua, a lawmaker from the People's Justice Party, condemned Izzah’s arrest and told AA: "Although the law allows a speech in parliament to be investigated, Nurul's detention is outrageous.”
He criticized Prime Minister Najib Razak for “using all laws, including the sedition law, to crack down on opposition in the hope of silencing all critical voices."
According to Chua, Izzah will be brought to court Tuesday as police will ask to detain her for four more days.
In his speech, Ibrahim had accused Malaysia’s judiciary of servitude to the current government in the speech, which included several other "seditious" statements regarding the judges that presided over his case.
"The case was a political conspiracy to end my political career," he said, offering the government’s releasing of a statement saying "the judiciary is fair" just "five minutes after verdict was given" as evidence.
Ibrahim was jailed in a Federal Court ruling that also rules him out of standing in the 2018 general election.
The case was first heard in 2012, when he was acquitted. The prosecution appealed the decision and in March last year Ibrahim was convicted on the same charge, which he appealed and lost last month.
The Federal Court is the highest court in Malaysia and its decision cannot be appealed. However, under the federal constitution, the monarch has the power to grant pardons.
Ibrahim has been the main opponent of the ruling party, which has been in power since independence in 1957, since falling out with the government in the late 1990s. The 2013 general election saw his opposition coalition come close to unseating the government in what Ibrahim dubbed the "worst electoral fraud in our history."
