Minister in the Prime Minister Department Dato’ Zaid Ibrahim announced resignation as a Cabinet Minister effective immediately. This came conveniently as a response to the reply of the Home Minister Dato’ Seri Syed Hamid Al Bar on Zaid’s stance on the ISA yesterday, on the wake of three persons arrested under the same law on Friday.
The Star has the story:
Don’t use ISA, says Zaid
By IAN MCINTYRE
KOTA BARU: De facto Law Minister Datuk Zaid Ibrahim (pic) stuck his neck out against the Government by condemning the use of the Internal Security Act (ISA) against civilians.
He urged the Government to revert to the original purpose of the law, which was to curb communism.
“It is time for the Government to go back to the original spirit of the ISA and it should only be used on armed terrorists or those out to topple the Government by force.
“I am not calling for a repeal of the ISA but for it to be used only when there is a real threat to national security and not on civilians,” he told a press conference at his home in Pasir Hor here yesterday.
According to Zaid, he was prepared to accept any consequences from his apparent breaking of ranks from the Cabinet over the issue of the ISA.
He said he was also willing to step down as a minister if his actions were deemed to have undermined the Government and Cabinet.
“I do not want to cause any trouble for Pak Lah (Abdullah). I respect what he is trying to change but on the matter of the ISA, I am against imposing it on civilians. I joined his administration to make changes and everybody knows, I am also for a more open-form of press reporting.”
Zaid was commenting on the arrests of Sin Chew Daily reporter Tan Hoon Cheng, Selangor senior executive councillor Teresa Kok and Malaysia Today news portal editor Raja Petra Kamaruddin on Friday under the Act. Tan was released on Saturday.
By using the ISA randomly, Zaid said, the Government was sending a message that it did not trust the capabilities of its own enforcement agencies such as the police in maintaining peace.
“There were ample punitive law to act against lawbreakers without having to invoke the ISA,” Zaid said.
Zaid, who is a Minister in the Prime Minister’s department, said the use of the ISA also creates an impression of selective prosecution as the Government cannot seemingly incarcerate everybody but only a handful.
“In this latest episode of ISA, we (the Government) have generated an impression of selective prosecution since no action was taken against the person who allegedly uttered seditious remarks. We are saying that we are only acting against those who are disloyal to us.”
He said he was glad that Tan was released but was concerned over the continued detention of the other two
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Zaid was making a statement against the Internal Security Act (ISA) which provided the Police powers to detain without trial suspects who threaten national security. This law is a tool closely protected by the Government when he was appointed Cabinet Minister in March.
Zaid has not proven himself yet, after six months in office. In reality, the one term Kota Bahru MP who was not given the opportunity to re-contest as the BN candidate in the 8 March 12th General Elections was very ambitious when he first appointed Cabinet Minister in March. He promised to revamp the Legal and Judciary, in six months.
He was seen as trying to be heroic when promptly mooted the idea for the Government to apologize to sacked Lord President Tun Mohamed Salleh Abas, which the Cabinet found totally inappropriate. The fact he went against his own statement on Salleh, made when he was acting as an aspiring lawyer for UMNO.
However, Zaid was instrumental in the act to reward all the dismissed Judges in 1988, which include sacked Lord President Tun Mohamed Salleh Abas. A large undisclosed sum of ex-gratia payment were inadvertantly announced by PM ‘Flip-Flop’ Abdullah at a dinner organised by Bar Council and eventually issued personally by Zaid to the dismissed Judges, which many found inappropriate. It even construed as an attempt to make PM ‘Flip-Flop’ Abdullah look good in the eyes of the minority within the legal professionals.
It seems that that Zaid is more concerned on the Bar Council’s opinion on himself rather his own Boss or his Cabinet/party leadership colleagues. The fact that the latest development in the Kota Bahru UMNO Division, despite as a Cabinet Minister Zaid received lesser nominations from the UMNO Branches compared to Dato’ Fatmi, who was only DPM Dato’ Seri Mohd. Najib Tun Razak’s former Political Secretary. This clearly illustrate the acceptance of the former’s position into mainstream politics, even at grassroot level.
Some thought this resignation is somewhat an ‘honourable’ quick exit from the disgrace being a failed Cabinet Minister and UMNO politician.
*Updated 245pm
The Star has the developing story:
Monday September 15, 2008 MYT 2:27:53 PM
Zaid Ibrahim quits?
By SHAILA KOSHY
KUALA LUMPUR: Speculation is rife that de facto law minister Datuk Zaid Ibrahim has resigned.
According to sources, the senator tendered his letter of resignation to Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi’s office just before 2pm on Monday.
Zaid could not be reached for confirmation.
The former Kota Baru MP was not fielded to stand in the March 8 general election.
Following the general election, however, Abdullah appointed him a Senator and a Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department.
In announcing his new Cabinet on March 18, Abdullah said that Zaid would be responsible for legal matters and take on the role to reform the judiciary.
It was only last Tuesday that Zaid said he might soon become a full-blown Law Minister with the requisite authority and responsibility to help him effect legal reform.
“In fact, my own position will be reviewed to Minister of Law to give me more authority but that will take time. You can’t have responsibility without authority,” he had said then.
However on Sunday, Zaid broke from rank to say that the use of the Internal Security Act against civilians was wrong, adding that he was prepared to resign over the issue.
Now Riong Kali try to spin against Najib?
Malaysian Insider.com published in their main page that DPM Dato’ Seri Mohd. Najib Tun Razak’s so called “commitment” to the ‘Leader Transition Plan’, due June 2010.
However, UMNO members close to the UMNO Deputy President confirmed that his earlier call for UMNO to decide on the “change-of-leader” be decided by UMNO Divisions when they started their Annual General Meetings beginning of October still stands.
UMNO members as grassroot has already voiced their utter displeasure of the weak leadership through informal channels, sometime within the party. Even at “Meet The Leader” forums, organised by UMNO, be it by State Liaison (including in the presence of UMNO management committee) or Division levels, grassroot leaders, especially Branch level have started to openly criticize the weak leadership and the ‘Flip-Flop’ policies. They believed that this is the main course why UMNO and BN performed poorly in the 8 March 2008 concluded 12th General Elections (12 GE) which saw the loss of control in 5 + 1 states.
This restlessness amongst UMNO grassroot is very apparent. Example is during the 12 GE, in the mainstay support of UMNO Johor where there are close to 500,000 UMNO registered members, saw over 100,000 spoilt vote casted. That is 1 in 3 of the national accumulated spoilt votes casted and UMNO members and supporters clearly illustrate their dismay in the Leadership by refusing to vote Oppositions but instead waste their usually treasured votes.
Malaysian Insider, a newsportal believed to be linked to Riong Kali and the Fox Media, is making another desperate attempt to spin stories very not reflective of the truth. Now that NST has lost its credibility, the alternative media seems to be Riong Kali’s new mode of spinning.
This, could not be anything else but an act of desperation.