KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 27 — Hundreds of Universiti Malaya (UM) students are standing in the rain in front of their campus, the heavy metal gates closed, forbidding looking as the country's oldest university seeks to keep out its alumnus, Opposition Leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim from delivering a highly-anticipated speech tonight, the eve of his high-profile court case.
Some are holding umbrellas, some wearing raincoats, some drenched to the skin in the earlier downpour as they wait out the handful of campus guards barring them from entering for a scheduled talk at 9pm where Anwar is the star speaker at the invitation of their student council.
The UM student council (PMUM) president Fahmi Zainol stands atop a truck parked in front of the locked gates, insisting campus security let them in.
"Bangkit! Bangkit! Bangkit Rakyat! Buka pintu! Buka pintu! Masuk UM!" he chants, and the crowd of students around him picks up the cry.
The crowd had started gathering as early as 6.30pm. Later, a handful of policemen in uniform and on motorcycles came and stood watch.
After more than two hours and their patience wearing thin, the students charge the closed gates and pushed their way through by sheer dint of their numbers.
The campus guards could only stand by and watch as the students walked in towards the venue of the talk, the Dewan Tunku Canselor, up on a rise.
Once inside, Fahmi pauses for a while to speak to the throng, "I'm proud of all the students present, I am scared just like you about the disciplinary action they will take on us."
Last Thursday, the UM administration issued a show-cause letter to Fahmi for organising the “40 Years: From University of Malaya to Jail” event on campus grounds with Anwar as the main speaker.
UM warned the student leader that he will be suspended from his studies and fined RM200 if he did not cancel the event.
UM's vice-chancellor in charge of student affairs Professor Datuk Rohani Yusof was reported saying the talk was against the University and University Colleges Act, though she did not elaborate on how it had breached the statute.
But Rohani was reported saying the student council had not sought the university's approval before inviting Anwar.
The 67-year-old Anwar had been a fiery student activist in the late 1960s, and had led the UM Malay Language Society as president as well as several other youth movements, including the National Union Of Malaysian Muslim Students and the Muslim Youth Movement of Malaysia (ABIM), which he co-founded.
The de facto head of Pakatan Rakyat (PR) has been touring the country ahead of an appeal hearing at the Federal Court tomorrow, after the Court of Appeal overturned his 2012 sodomy acquittal.
He was sentenced to five years in jail but was granted a stay of execution, pending an appeal to the Federal Court scheduled for the next two days.
The Permatang Pauh MP was charged with sodomy for the second time after a former male aide, Mohd Saiful Bukhari, complained of being sodomised by the politician at the Desa Damansara condominium in upscale Bukit Damansara on June 26, 2008.
If Anwar fails to reverse his five-year imprisonment sentence and conviction in the Federal Court tomorrow, he would lose his seat as the law bars anyone fined RM2,000 or imprisoned for one year from serving as a lawmaker.
