The constitutionality and validity of the Sedition Act 1948 cannot be challenged, the Federal Court sitting in Putrajaya ruled today.

Chief Judge of Malaya Zulkefli Ahmad Makinudin said Article 4 (2) (b) of the federal constitution states that such a law cannot be challenged.

"The Sedition Act is a good law and is not ultra vires the federal constitution," said Justice Zulkefli who chaired a five-man panel that unanimously dismissed lawyer P Uthayakumar’s appeal to declare the Act unconstitutional.

He said the arguments made by M Manoharan, counsel for Uthayakumar (left) had no merits.

Manoharan had argued that the Sedition Act contravened the Federal Constitution because Article 10 (1) (a) of the Constitution recognised freedom of speech and expression as the fundamental right of all citizens.

Uthayakumar was appealing against the Court of Appeal’s Feb 24 decision that upheld the decision of the Kuala Lumpur High Court in dismissing his application to declare the Sedition Act unconstitutional.

Justice Zulkefli said Article 10 (2) empowered Parliament to enact restrictions on the Act, adding that it was a qualified freedom relating to the freedom of speech under condition.

Federal Court judges Suriyadi Halim Omar, Hasan Lah, Zaleha Zahari and Zainun Ali were the other judges on the panel.

Charged with publishing a seditious letter on website

Uthayakumar, 49, a former Internal Security Act detainee, was charged in a Kuala Lumpur sessions court on Dec 11, 2007, with publishing a seditious letter on the ‘Police Watch Malaysia’ website, dated Nov 15, 2007, addressed to then-prime minister of Britain, Gordon Brown.

He made the declaratory application (to declare the Sedition Act unconstitutional), in a bid to have the charge against him under the Act to be revoked and the prosecution in the proceedings in the sessions Court be struck out.

This case is fixed for case management on July 18 at the Kuala Lumpur sessions court.

Earlier, Manoharan (right) had submitted that the Sedition Act was unconstitutional because the scheme of the Act makes it an offence for a person to merely act, speak or publish statements with a "seditious tendency" without any requirement on the part of the prosecution to prove that the words were indeed seditious.

He also said the truth of the seditious statements also need not be proven.

Deputy public prosecutor Noorin Badarudin submitted that the right to freedom of speech as guaranteed under Article 10 (1) of the Federal Constitution was not an absolute right.

Noorin said Article 10 (2) states that Parliament was empowered to pass laws to restrict the right to freedom of speech.

"Freedom of speech is seriously restricted. It cannot be in our country a non-absolute freedom and unrestricted right," she said.

Noorin said the Sedition Act came within the permitted restriction under Article 10 (2) and therefore the law stood valid.

- Bernama