KUALA LUMPUR: The decision of two young people to seek political asylum rather than face justice for their alleged offences is a symptom of the youth’s growing frustrations towards Putrajaya’s clampdown on political dissent, say analysts.

If Putrajaya continues its sedition blitz to silence critics, Malaysia is setting itself up for a future it is not prepared for, they told The Malaysian Insider.

Dr Lim Teck Ghee, who heads the Centre for Policy Initiatives, said student activist Ali Abd Jalil and sex blogger Alvin Tan’s cases could be a new trend if authoritarian measures and hard-line religious attitudes worsened.

“These will be some of your more educated and more talented ones who find the political repression intolerable,” he said, adding that thousands more Malaysians who are not politically persecuted would also give up on Malaysia if Putrajaya does not ease its grip on opposing ideological views.

Ibrahim Suffian, who heads independent pollster Merdeka Center, said the country’s youth are now being taught not to speak up, and eventually Putrajaya would have to pay the price for it.

“We have a large and young electorate. And if we are teaching them to be fearful to speak up now, we are gearing them up for a future of ‘voicelessness’ and force them underground which will create frustration over time.

“It’s a long process but if this keeps going on like this where the space for civilised disagreement is closed, we are setting ourselves up for something we are not prepared for in the future.

“I think the recent spate of charges has had a chilling effect on the whole climate of dissent and on what is going on here currently,” he said.

Dr Wong Chin Huat, a fellow at think-tank Penang Institute, said Ali’s case in particular would leave an impression on Malay-speaking, underprivileged youth frustrated with the government.

“Ali is out there and given his combative character, he will continue to shout from overseas and become the face of a Malaysian in exile.

“Speaking in a religious tone, he compares unquestionable loyalty to royalty with idolatry. This will strike a chord among the Malays, especially those who speak Malay and are underprivileged.

“Ali seeking asylum brings forward the debate: should an ideological position be criminalised even if it was advocated peacefully?” he said.

“There appears to be three camps in the government: the authoritarian, moderate and couldn’t-care-less camps, with the authoritarian and couldn’t-care-less camps in the ascendency.

“They (the moderates) need to take urgent action to abolish the Sedition Act and related policies and remove individuals, such as the attorney-general under whose watch the current barrage of sedition cases has taken place,” said Lim.

In a Facebook posting on Saturday, Ali said he fled to Sweden to seek asylum abroad, adding he was not safe in Malaysia as he had been threatened by gangsters and “racist Malay groups”.

Ali faces three sedition charges for allegedly insulting the Johor royalty and the Sultan of Selangor in his Facebook postings. — The Malaysian Insider

This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily, on October 28, 2014.