Malaysian students vow to defy Najib Razak’s crackdown on dissent with rally calling for arrests over 1MDB scandal
Najib has tightened his grip on the ruling party and imposed draconian security and sedition laws to intimidate critics and stifle free speech
Defying Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak’s crackdown on dissent, student activists made plans for a mass rally on Saturday to call for the arrest of an unnamed official who US investigators say received US$700 million skimmed from a sovereign fund.
A source familiar with the US investigations has indicated the unnamed official is Najib, though he has denied any wrongdoing in the scandal that first erupted over 1Malaysia Development Bhd (1MDB) last year.
You will not be able to run away from the people’s power. Wherever you hide, the people’s power will catch you and drag you to face justice
Najib’s government was jolted in July, when US prosecutors filed several civil lawsuits over money allegedly defrauded from 1MDB. The lawsuits repeatedly referred to a high ranking official, only identified as “Malaysian Official 1”, who received more than US$700 million of the misappropriated funds.
The organisers of the planned rally have seized on that description to call the government to account.
“To Malaysian Official 1, you will not be able to run away from the people’s power. Wherever you hide, the people’s power will catch you and drag you to face justice,” Anis Syafiqah Md Yusof, a student representative, said at a press conference earlier this week.
The students plan to gather at Dataran Merdeka, or Independence Square, defying warnings from the country’s police chief to stay away from the square, where Najib supporters also plan to hold a counter-rally, raising the risk of clashes.