KUALA LUMPUR: Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad has questioned the rationale behind the arrest of journalists, saying it would only turn Malaysia into a police state.

In a video uploaded on the blog Apanama yesterday, the former prime minister said there was no need for police to nab editors and top executives from The Edge Media Group, which owns The Malaysian Insider (TMI).

“When I heard of the arrests of these reporters for saying ... something so-called seditious ... I don’t think that is the right way to use your power,” he said, referring to the arrest of The Edge Media Group publisher and chief executive officer and four others from TMI by police in late March for sedition.

“Of course, you can say it is not him, it is the police, but we don’t want to become a police state,” he said.

The five were detained over a report published on March 25, which said the Conference of Rulers had rejected a proposal to amend a federal law that would pave the way for hudud to be enforced in Kelantan.

The Keeper of the Rulers’ Seal lodged a police report on March 26 to deny that the Conference of Rulers had discussed the matter, adding that it had never issued any statement on hudud in Kelantan.

Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak, however, defended the controversial Sedition Act, saying that the use of the act was a preventive measure.

Najib reportedly said there was no reason for the government to apologise for using it, despite international criticism against the colonial-era law.

He also reminded Malaysians not to belittle efforts of the police force in ensuring public safety.

Home Minister Datuk Seri Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, when wrapping up the debate on amendments to the Sedition Act 1948 in Parliament last week, assured the House that there would be no abuse of power in enforcing the amended act.

He added that cases would only be brought to court once the Attorney-General had 90% proof and that was why not all who were arrested and investigated by the police were subsequently charged in court.

On concerns that the definitions of seditious acts and “seditious tendencies” in the law were vague and open to abuse by the authorities, Ahmad Zahid said the definition of “seditious tendencies” was spelt out in the act. — The Malaysian Insider

This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily, on April 15, 2015.