Every man and even lesser beings are born with 2 gifts: the gifts of life and liberty. Through the ages many are those who have made the conscious choice of death over loss of liberty, not only for themselves personally but in many cases unselfishly for the liberty of others.

Liberty includes but is not limited to the freedom of speech and expression, the freedom of choosing one’s faith, the freedom of movement and the list goes on.

As man started to organize into villages, towns, cities, provinces, states and nations, there arose a need to provide means and methods to preserve life and liberty. It must be said that in many cases the preservation of life and liberty came at a very high cost in terms of life and liberty.

All through recorded history there are numerous examples of famous people making the choosing liberty in the face of death which inevitably was preceded by various means of not-so-gentle persuasion.

As settlements morphed and evolved into sovereign states, these nations promulgated various laws to protect these liberties. Taking a citizen’s life and property by force were termed as murder and theft respectively. Tolerance of ideological differences in a nation’s populace formed the cornerstone of a truly democratic country.

“POWER CORRUPTS: ABSOLUTE POWER CORRUPTS ABSOLUTELY” Sadly in many so-called democracies, many an elected leader has justified his election by the people of the country to make sure he stays in power. Examples abound, both near and far.

In this wonderful country of our birth, all men are born equal but some are born more equal than others. This invariably gives rise to clamors for equality in all spheres. Sadly any voicing of concern for this gives rise to cries of rights being questioned.

During that period the sovereignty our country was threatened by remnants of the MPAJA who were hell bent on imposing their ideology on our fledgling democracy coming to grips with the challenges that face a multi-racial, democratically elected government.

Our founding fathers did what had to be done: they enacted laws for preventive detention.

Preventive detention was first implemented in Malaya by the British in 1948 to combat the armed insurgency of the Malayan Communist Party during the Malayan Emergency. The Emergency Regulations Ordinance 1948 was enacted by the British High Commissioner Sir Edward Gent. It allowed the detention of persons for a period not exceeding one year. This ordinance targeted at acts of violence and only imposed temporary detention.

The Malayan Emergency ended in 1960 and the ordinance was repealed. However, preventive detention was retained and remains a feature of Malaysian law today. In 1960, the government passed the Internal Security Act (ISA) under the authority granted by Article 149 of the Malaysian Constitution.

The stated purpose of the ISA was to deter communist activity in Malaysia during the Malayan Emergency and afterwards. The first Prime Minister of Malaysia, Tunku Abdul Rahman, defined the purpose of the act as to “be used solely against the communists…My Cabinet colleagues and I gave a solemn promise to Parliament and the nation that the immense powers given to the government under the ISA would never be used to stifle legitimate opposition and silence lawful dissent”. The third Prime Minister, Tun Hussein Onn, stated at the same time that his administration had enforced the act only with a view to curbing communist activity, and not to repress “lawful political opposition and democratic citizen activity”.

In response to criticism that the ISA was not democratic or was too open to abuse, the first internal security minister, Tun Dr Ismail Abdul Rahman, stated:

“I maintained then and I maintain now the view that the Internal Security Act is essential to the security of this country especially when democracy is interpreted the way it is interpreted in this country. To those in opposition to the government democracy is interpreted to mean absolute freedom, even the freedom to subvert the nation. When cornered by the argument that democracy in the Western sense means freedom in an ordered society and an ordered society is one in which the rule of law prevails, they seek refuge in the slogan that we should imitate Western democracy one hundred per cent.

I am convinced that the Internal Security Act as practiced in Malaysia is not contrary to the fundamentals of democracy. Abuse of the Act can be prevented by vigilant public opinion via elections, a free Press and above all the Parliament.

As can be seen above Bapa Malaysia, Tunku Abdul Rahman gave a solemn promise to Parliament that the ISA would never be used to stifle legitimate opposition and silence lawful dissent. Tun Hussein Onn, the father of the serving (reigning?) home minister stated unequivocally that his administration had enforced the act only with a view of curbing communist activity and not to repress “lawful political opposition and democratic citizen activity.”

The man who is credited with drafting the ISA, the much-admired, much-loved and at times much-maligned Tun Dr Ismail stated that any abuse of the Act can be prevented by vigilant public opinion via elections, a free press and above all the Parliament.

Post 9/11 the need for preventive detention has seen bastions of democracy enact laws similar to our ISA. However in many of those countries detention, preventive or otherwise is subject to judicial review by impartial, independent judges who put the liberty of citizens above all.

Malaysia needs the ISA now more than any other time in its history. However now more than any other time its implementation must be subject to judicial review AND must only be used against those who wage war against the Yang Di Pertuan Agong. The Executive must act with transparency.

The Internal Security Act 1960 cannot and should not be used to stifle lawful and legitimate political opposition. The Act should only be enforced with a view of curbing communist activity and not to repress lawful democratic citizen activity.

In this day and age threats to our internal security have taken many different forms and about the only way to deter would be saboteurs of our nation and its liberties would be to have the ISA hanging like the proverbial sword of Democeles over their heads.

The rights to liberty, life and property are enshrined in the supreme law of the land. Wanton use, abuse and misuse of the ISA is a blatant and utter disregard of the safeguards to life and liberty embedded in the Federal Constitution.

As our beloved Malaysia needs ISA to continue developing and maintaining peace among all races, we must ensure that all the save guards are in place to prevent it’s abuse. The peoples or persons entrusted to carry out the duties must always ensure justices and freedom prevails and it is not enforce “Ikut Suka Aku“. A blatant abuse was evident when ISA was used unjustly against a reporter for her personal protection. Such abuse will not be tolerated by the Rakyat and what ever flimsy excuse given would be seen as an abuse of ISA.

Therefore save guards such as judicial review and enforcement for the correct reasons must be paramount in the review and amendment of the ISA. This is to ensure that ISA is not abuse for any other purpose than what it is meant for.

Gerakan4U Bulletin Sept 2010 / Vol.4

by Sdra Baljit Singh
Legal & Human Rights Bureau Chief