Harakah seized nationwide

Pas official newspaper Harakah for Friday publication was seized nationwide by the Home Ministry (KDN) this morning.

Harakah group editor, Ahmad Lutfi Othman verified the news and stated the act by the ministry contradicts with the Printing Presses and Publication Act 1984.

"We received a call at 9.30 am this morning from the distributors, who said Harakah was seized by KDN.

"This action seems like a revenge by the Barisan Nasional (BN) because the 13th General Election results were not in their favour. It is like a blackmail to the distributors, preventing them from selling Harakah," he said to Astro Awani.

Ahmad Lutfi also said that KDN had ambushed the distributor’s premises.

In Kedah, officials had taken away the papers from inside the lorries even before they were sent to the shops.

The papers were seized at Melaka, Negeri Sembilan, Kedah and Perak states. It is estimated that about 1,000 Harakah copies were seized in Alor Setar and more than 500 copies in Malacca.

According to Ahmad Lufti, five KDN vans were used in the exercise. The Friday newspaper May 24-26 edition features the "GST hadiah BN untuk rakyat" (GST present by BN for the people) headline.