Cabinet agreed to Sedition Act repeal, insists Nazri

The decision to abolish the Sedition Act was made by the Cabinet last year, said Datuk Seri Mohamed Nazri Aziz (pic), providing some clarity to an episode which continues to embarass the Najib administration.

He said the Attorney-General's Chambers is working on it and is currently engaging stakeholders before coming out with a new law.

"While I was the de facto Law Minister, Najib had clearly spelled out his commitment to the Cabinet to repeal the Sedition Act and replace it with a National Harmony Act," Nazri said.

"Maybe (Health Minister) Dr S. Subramaniam has forgotten... the issue was more than a year ago. But I was the minister responsible for legal matters at that time," he told reporters in Parliament today.

Subramaniam had earlier today said that the repealing of the Sedition Act was merely Najib's suggestion, and as the country's leader, he had the right to propose such actions.

"But the Cabinet has not met and reached a decision on whether the Sedition Act should be repealed. It is only a suggestion from Najib," Dr Subramaniam said this morning at the Parliament.

Home Minister Datuk Seri Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, who is leading the charge to keep the Sedition Act, was also the Defence Minister at the time.

Today Nazri declined to comment on the contradiction brought about by Ahmad Zahid's change in position on the Sedition Act but reiterated he was only interested in facts.

Nazri said Najib was committed to his decision made in July last year that the Sedition Act would be repealed and replaced with a different statute.

"I remember when Najib made his promise, it was during his speech at a law conference held at KLCC."

Pressure from various quarters previously had led to the dissolution of the Internal Security Act and the Emergency Ordinance in 2012.

Ahmad Zahid, the Bagan Datoh MP, had attributed the spike in crime cases to the repealing of the preventive laws.