KUCHING, Oct 11 — Accusing the state of political discrimination, Sarawak DAP announced today it has formed a legal team to challenge the travel ban denying a peninsula-based federal lawmaker entry.

State DAP chief Chong Chieng Jen said the six-man team, led by its adviser and senior lawyer Chong Siew Chiang, will file for a judicial review of the immigration law used by the Barisan Nasional (BN) state government against Petaling Jaya Utara MP Tony Pua.

“We have six weeks to file the application from September 23, the day Pua was deported from Sarawak,” he told a news conference here.

While conceding Chief Minister Tan Sri Adenan Satem has the prerogative on immigration matters, Chong said there was no valid reason to keep Pua or other peninsula-based opposition lawmakers out of the Borneo state unless it was to maintain the BN’s political hegemony.

“I would expect Adenan to have more sense of justice and fair play in exercising the state’s autonomy over immigration, and not abuse it at his whims and fancies and based on his personal feelings or in the interest of the state Barisan Nasional government,” said the lawyer and Kota Sentosa assemblyman.

He said opposition leaders should be allowed to enter Sarawak to conduct legitimate political activities as they are not in the group of the generally recognised racists and religious extremists, like Perkasa president Datuk Ibrahim Ali and controversial Chinese convert Ridhuan Tee Abdullah.

“Pua does not smell like a racist or religious bigot. I have never heard of him making racist statements in the past,” Chong said.

Pua was to officiate a DAP-backed Impian Malaysia project in Lutong, Miri, when he was told to leave Sarawak on the next available flight.

The opposition party’s national publicity secretary was also scheduled to visit several rural projects in Miri, Lawas, Kuching and Bintulu under the party’s Impian Sarawak initiative.

Apart from Pua, other peninsula-based federal lawmakers refused entry into the Borneo state have included the party’s Seputeh MP Teresa Kok, PKR secretary-general and Pandan MP Rafizi Ramli and PKR Wanita chief and Ampang MP Zuraida Kamaruddin.