Aku dan AUKU

So, last week's classes has been quite political.

The first thing I realised this week is that I haven't paying too much attention to the news lately. Dr. Johan asked what are the constitutional issues of concern in Malaysia right now and I was rendered speechless.

I knew something was up somewhere, just couldn't put my finger exactly on it.

The class went on as usual. In the replacement class the next day he asked again. This time, I knew a lot knew so I waited for their answer. As expected, a group from the back of the class shouted "The AUKU was ruled unconstitutional!"

Yes. Yes. So the story goes like this, during the last Selangor by-election, four UKM students were found with flyers supporting of the opposition coalition. They got expelled, If I'm not mistaken. So they're the UKM Four. Cool kan? Macam nama superheroes.

Okay, back to the story. Why all the fuss?

Simple, under the Akta Universiti dan Kolej Universiti, section 15 states that undergrads cannot express their support or otherwise for any political party while they are still studying.

What?

So.. After 21, we can get married, be parents, smoke, run a business, sell land, but as long as we're in university, we can't be involved in politics?

Well, I know this law might sound absurd to a lot of you, but that's the law. A lot of us would like the harshness of the law, yes. I hear you guys. It's harshness in a level of its own. But what's the wider implication to all this?

I think its not really the harshness, it's the constitutionality of it all. We live in this country with certain rights and liberty. Freedom of association is fundemental, everyone knows that. Should the paranoia of certain sectors of society be a detriment to that?

The very reason for this freedom is for us to not be afraid to move, to dare, to think. Here we are restricting the political rights of very people we depend on to push the country forward.

These kinds of law just make us so afraid to freely question and express our thoughts, like the ISA. It's too wide as well. Furthermore, it insults my intelligence, honestly. It says that "no, you're too stupid to join politics. You won't be able to juggle your studies."

When the subject was brought up, I commented that we have given the government too much power until they could legislate such laws since 1972 and get away with it. Why did it took so long for us to bring this to court to challenge this?

I know perhaps the intention was good when they made this law. In those days confrontation between political parties was not exactly rare. We all remember 13 May, Ops Lalang, and some other sporing small stuff.

That was then. We formed a new country, perhaps many would like to compete to be in front of it all.

However, I think with the passing of time we're more concerned about making the country a better place to be in rather than competing to be on top. I mean, do you see the kind of stuff political leaders have to go through? Kena maki hamun hari-hari. I wouldn't want to be PM.

In tutorials, it was discussed again. One said that the law should stay. We can't allow the undergraduates to be involved in politics, because there would be certain chaos. As if the political leaders would just come to campus, brainwash the students and turn them into political zombies. I know, I get her point.

That's a concern as well. At this age, we're still a bit tender. We're prone to influence and perhaps we can be subjected to a little brainwash. However, we're talking about university students here. Isn't that a qualification of its own to join politics?

We have so much to lose. If we get too involved in politics, yes of course it would affect our grades. We're in university. I think we know not to go to the extreme with politics. It takes up study time. At least we have an indicator for us to know if we went too far.

The DPM said that students are in university to study and develop their minds without much interruption. Okay, not exactly that, but you know the works. So being involved in politics is a problem? How about online games? Sports? Work?

Want a fairer law? Ban political association to everyone, not just university undergraduates. Now that is a standpoint I don't wanna mess with.

Imagine a situation, where law student of UM graduated first-class and decided to make the country a better place by joining politics just to find out that some kid who went to a private college taking graphic design with a 2.0 pointer is the Ketua Pemuda for a big-shot political party. It happens.

I'm not saying that he shouldn't be the Ketua Pemuda for anything, I mean, good for him. But there was a lot of wasted oppurtunity for the university student. A lot to catch up. We all know that politics is a popularity contest to a certain point, especially in our democracy.

There's a good chance this case will go to the Federal Court. So I'll save more of my 'commentary' until then. So for now, lets all feel good about the Court of Appeal decision and go support all the political parties. All. Of. Them. Why not kan?