KUALA LUMPUR, April 8 — Multicultural Malaysia is risking its image as an “open-minded and easy-going society” with the recent passage of a new preventive law to combat terrorism, a senior journalist with British newspaper The Guardian has said.

In his analysis of the proposed Prevention of Terrorism Bill (Pota) yesterday, Simon Tisdall cautioned the government against following other rigid and authoritarian regimes in Southeast Asia to build a modern state, citing Thailand, Singapore and Myanmar as examples.

He noted that Thailand was in a “dire situation” with its current and unelected Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha giving himself “sweeping dictatorial powers” in the name of national security.

Singapore founder Lee Kuan Yew had built a modern nation out of nothing, but employed repressive tactics with arbitrary arrests and capital punishment to cow its citizens to toe the line, Tisdall said.

“Malaysia need not travel this road. Multi-ethnic and multicultural, it broke with Lee’s Singapore in 1965 and has traditionally been viewed, rightly, as a more open-minded, easy-going society,” The Guardian’s assistant editor said in his article titled “Malaysia uses specious terrorism threat to regress on human rights’.

Despite police’s warnings of the spread of Islamic State (IS) — also known as ISIS — terror cells within the country and the need for stricter legislation to combat the rise of militant groups, the British newsman argued that Malaysia does not have a “serious” terrorism problem compared to other Muslim countries.

“Police say 92 Malaysians have been detained over the past year for alleged links to ISIS in Syria, while others are sympathetic to the group.

“However, the numbers are small compared with the many hundreds of European Muslims who have joined ISIS,” Tisdall said.

He insisted that the new anti-terror law, coupled with the Special Measures Against Terrorism in Foreign Countries Bill, is a “blot” on Malaysia’s leadership.

Pota was passed at 2.25am yesterday by a slim 19-vote margin after a 12-hour-long debate in Parliament. — Picture by Saw Siow Feng

Much like the arrests of political dissenters under the now-repealed Internal Security Act (ISA), Tisdall pointed out that close to 20 people were arrested before the Bill was voted on, which “heighten fears that the new powers will be abused.”

“By coincidence or not, police detained 17 people alleged to be plotting terror attacks in Kuala Lumpur on the eve of the parliamentary vote,” he said.

Pota was passed at 2.25am yesterday by a slim 19-vote margin after a 12-hour-long debate in Parliament.

Opposition lawmakers have claimed such provisions mirror that of the dreaded ISA that had been specifically enacted to combat the Communist insurgency of its time, but had later been used to silence political opposition to the establishment.  

Malay Mail Online reported on Sunday former Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Abdul Rahim Noor as describing the proposed Pota as a revival of the ISA, adding that this new preventive law will help keep the IS terrorist threat in check and nip extremism in the bud.

However, Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin has rubbished the comparison.

“There are people claiming that Pota is purportedly ‘ISA 2’ and this allegation is not true because it is specifically to tackle problems concerning terrorism,” he was quoted by national news agency Bernama as saying during a question and answer session at the Meeting with Malaysian Nationals in Jakarta last night.

Tisdall also questioned the timing of the arrests of 17 people alleged to be plotting terror attacks in Kuala Lumpur on the eve of the parliamentary vote. — Today file picture