The protest trouble in Universiti Malaya is far from over as it has instead scaled new heights as another student was barred from entering his own graduation hall!
Last Monday, an incident went viral as a graduate who showed a placard containing a list of reasons on why the vice-chancellor should resign to the audience and chancellors of Universiti Malaya during a convocation ceremony as a sign of protest. This sparked a debate of whether or not his actions were appropriate. While many thought his actions were disrespectful and inconsiderate, there’s also a group of people who found his actions commendable and explained that a protest does not occur at the convenience of the party being protested against.
In a statement released by Universiti Malaya today, they said that after the previous protest, they have tightened the security to avoid such incidents from happening again. According to them, the student who was barred from his graduation hall, Eden Kon Hua En, made a Facebook post in solidarity with the student who protested.
In the post, Eden asks his fellow graduates to cross their hands as a sign of protest towards their Vice-Chancellor to send a strong message. Following this post, he was barred from entering the graduation hall as the university felt he was to about to protest as the previous person did. Eden then released a video on Facebook explaining how he wasn’t allowed to enter the hall even after he assured them multiple times that he wouldn’t pull any stunt.
According to the statement, UM also mentioned that they confiscated a placard with offensive language that was hidden. Eden later shared a lengthy post on how the university practised an alternate principle of “guilty until proven guilty”, and also how he felt like a prisoner when he was quarantined by auxillary police.
We hope this issue gets resolved soon as racial tension is the last thing our country currently needs, and we need to be careful as to not let history repeat itself.
Also read: HK Protestor Threatens M’sian Woman With Hammer, Hits Her BF’s Head For Taking Pics of Protest