The Penang state government will appeal to the Court of Appeal against the High Court decision disallowing leave to file a judicial review against the Home Ministry’s Decision banning the state government’s Voluntary Patrol Team(PPS) as illegal. The Penang state government is surprised by the Penang High Court decision today disallowing leave without the merits of the case being heard by the courts.
I have instructed the Penang state government lawyers, Datuk Ambiga Sreenevasan and MP for Puching Gobind Singh Deo to file an appeal the soonest possible. The Penang state government maintains the PPS was properly constituted and had co-operated with all the relevant authorities, including police, to conduct community policing to assist the police in reducing crime. For 3 years, there were no problems, until the PPS was demonised by some BN supporters, who were then seen in the notorious racist red-shirt rally on 16.9.2015.
The Penang government filed for a judicial review on 27.1.2015 to challenge the ban on PPS as political victimization by the federal government. The police had arrested 158 PPS members, including several MPs and assemblymen, for taking part in the Merdeka parade last year. Penang is seeking a declaration that the PPS was legally established by the state government, based on Section 101 (v) of the Local Government Act 1976, that PPS is not a society as stated in the 1966 Societies Act.