Malaysia detains 12 activists ahead of anti-PM rally

Demonstrators gathered in the tens of thousands in Kuala Lumpur on November 19 calling for the resignation of Prime Minister Najib Razak, AP reported.

“Let him come and arrest us all”. He claimed the protests are a stunt by the opposition to force the prime minister out of power. It said there were about 4000 red-shirts on the streets.

At the third rally, they followed the orders of their leader and rammed police barriers, causing a commotion. No clashes were reported.

Mr. Najib denies wrongdoing and says his accusers need to “move on”, but past year purged critics and shut down domestic investigations.

People in thousands, wearing yellow T-shirts in support of Bersih, walked the streets of the capital with drums and vuvuzelas.

Najib said the government would continue to focus on good governance to ensure that the people benefited from all its programmes. “He is abusing the law”, Mahathir said.

If there is a man in Malaysia you do not want to annoy it is former PM Mahathir, and now the corrupt and evil Government of Najib has attracted his anger. “We want fair elections”, Derek Wong, 38, a real estate agent, told AFP.

“As a citizen I am now here peacefully to decide the future of the country”.

The rally is not just to demand for institutional reforms but to protest injustices from happening in the country.

The activist group has also called for rallies in the cities of Kota Kinabalu and Kuching on the Malaysian side of Borneo. The turnout was less than the 50,000 who attended the last Bersih rally, in August 2015, which also demanded that Najib quit.

“Sosma has now been used against Bersih when it should only be used against genuine security cases or terrorists”, co-founder of Lawyers for Liberty Eric Paulsen said on Twitter.

Lawsuits filed by the US Justice Department in July say more than $700 million of misappropriated funds from 1MDB flowed into the accounts of “Malaysian Official 1”, whom US and Malaysian officials have identified as Najib. He denies any wrongdoing.

Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak said he hoped that Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe could convince Trump that the TPP would not only benefit the 11 countries, but also the US.

Earlier this week, a court sentenced Rafizi Ramli, the secretary general of the opposition Parti Keadilan Rakyat, to 18 months in prison for violating the Official Secrets Act by releasing a damaging audit report on the 1MDB scandal, in which almost US$700 million was allegedly diverted from the fund into Najib’s personal account in 2013.

Pro-democracy group Bersih, which represents a group of non-governmental organisations, organised the protest rally.

Authorities had tried to thwart the day-long peaceful demonstration by arresting at least eight protest leaders Friday, including Bersih’s chairwoman, Maria Chin Abdullah.

1MDB has fuelled gloom among progressives and reform advocates who had already accused Najib of reneging on earlier promises to eliminate graft and end the 59-year-old ruling coalition’s repressive tendencies.

Amnesty International slammed the arrests and called for the immediate release of the activists, describing them as prisoners of conscience.