The latest person to be investigated by the police for saying something that displeased the authorities is Pahang MCA Youth chief Wong Siew Mun.
She is being investigated under Section 505(b) of the Penal Code and Section 233 of the Communications and Multimedia Act 1998 .
For context, Section 505 (b) of the penal code states deals with cases where someone : makes, publishes or circulates any statement, rumour or report with intent to cause fear or alarm to the public, and induce them to commit an offence against the State or against the public tranquility."
Section 233 of the Communications and Multimedia Act 1998 on the other hand deals with the "Improper Use of Network Facilities or Network Service". It essentially criminalizes the online transmission of content that is deemed obscene, indecent, false, menacing, or offensive, with the intent to annoy, abuse, threaten, or harass another person.
So what is it that Wong Siew Mun did to trigger the authorities to use these two laws against her you ask ?
Well, she is being questioned by the police because she made a video where she will she raise her concerns about a request from the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission to telcos to collect mobile phone data.
The investigation centres on a video in which Wong referenced a South China Morning Post report and questioned the motive behind MCMC’s request to mobile network operators to submit user data.
According to MCMC, the data collection initiative did not involve the access, processing or disclosure of any personally identifiable information.
Instead, MCMC Commissioner Derek John Fernandez said the mobile phone data would be used strictly to generate official statistics to support evidence-based policymaking in the information and communications technology sector and the tourism sector.
If that be the case, then I don’t understand why the authorities are getting so edgy about people disputing the motives of their action.
If I truly wanted to do something good for you – like give you money or help you out with your affairs – but you dispute my intentions, I won’t have any problem in not giving you the money or helping you out. If I truly only wished to do something out of good intentions, when you decline my gesture or suspect my gestures, I would not have any problem withdrawing my offer, much less report you to the cops, simply because you declined my gesture.
I won’t, because chances are that to help you out is going to cause me at least some difficulties, so if you don’t want me to help you out even after I offer you my help, it is going to save me the trouble of enduring any difficulties.
In the same way, if MCMC truly only wanted to get our mobile phone data from the telcos to support policy making in the ICT And tourism sector, I don’t see why it can’t just ask people to volunteer their data to them. Some people might decline to provide them with the data, but many will probably not mind giving it. If I were MCMC and I truly just wanted to help the ICT And tourism sector, I would just take the data from the ones who have no problem giving them to me and do the best with what I have first.
Once my work starts to bear result and people can see that MCMC truly just intends to use the data to improve the country, I am sure that many of the people who did not feel comfortable forwarding their mobile phone data to MCMC earlier, would change their mind and no longer mind giving MCMC their mobile phone data.
When instead of doing that, the authorities is calling the cops to act on someone simply for raising doubts about MCMC motives, not only is it alleviating the doubt of people who are already given to suspect MCMC’s motives, it is only raising suspicion about MCMC’s motives amongst people who didn’t even have any doubt about MCMC’s motives initially.
Take me for example – Initially I didn't have any doubt about the authorities wanting to get mobile phone data from telcos, but after hearing the authorities acting so forcefully against the Pahang MCA Youth chief Wong Siew Mun, I am finding doubt to be increasingly growing in my heart.
If you truly mean well, you are never going to force yourself on others. Why should you? You mean well after all. If people don’t want what you have to give them, it is they who are going to suffer a loss, not you.
When you say you mean well, but then you force people to accept it, that is when people will suspect whether you truly mean well, or whether you have an ulterior motive.
When you call the cops on people who suspect whether you truly mean well, after you force people to accept what you have to offer, then can you fault the people for really having doubt as to whether you are as well-meaning as you claim?
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