KUALA LUMPUR, May 22 — The forced entry by Umno members into the Penang state assembly yesterday was a “disgraceful and unacceptable” descent into mob rule, DAP’s Gobind Singh Deo said today.

Urging authorities to pursue action against the alleged intruders with haste, the Puchong MP said failure to do so would depict Malaysia as a country without respect for the rule of law.

“Such an attack on either Parliament or any of the State Legislative Assemblies, to my mind, amounts to an attack on democracy itself. We cannot allow such incidents to pass without the most severe of punishment,” he said in a statement today.

“This is not the first time this has happened. In February 2009, a group comprising of Umno Youth members confronted the late YB Karpal Singh in Parliament. That nearly resulted in a fist fight between MP's present and the group.”

Gobind’s father, Karpal, was killed in a traffic accident last month.

Yesterday, a group of Umno members gathered outside the Penang assembly building in George Town before forcibly breaching the gates to storm into the main hall.

They had demanded to see Seri Delima state assemblyman RSN Rayer to extract an apology from the lawmaker who had allegedly uttered the words “Umno celaka” (Umno be damned) on Tuesday.

More than 10 of them created a ruckus inside the main hall while demanding to know where Rayer sits in the hall, before leaving frustrated.

Police later detained a dozen individuals over the incident.

The group then said it will return to the state assembly today to reattempt meeting with Nayer for the demanded apology.