KUALA LUMPUR: The Pakatan Harapan government will be tabling a Bill in Parliament to reform prison and police lock-ups said PKR vice president Nurul Izzah Anwar.
"We will be passing on our views to the Institutional Reform Committee while also tabling a Private Members' Bill in the next Parliament sitting on the matter," she told reporters at the pre-launch ceremony of a book entitled 'Tian Chua's - Kajang Dairy : A Prison Retreat' at KLCC Convention Centre here on Thursday (June 14).
She noted that current prison and police detention regulations were outdated and needed to be refreshed.
"We need to bring our present system, which is archaic and under the British thumb, to match current needs and requirements," Nurul Izzah said.
She added that the previous Government intended to reform the system but lacked the political will to do so.
Nurul Izzah said she is appalled at the punitive nature of the current prison system which is not geared towards rehabilitating offenders.
Tian Chua, who had been arrested on numerous occasions and detained under the former Internal Security Act, said reforms were necessary, particularly at detention centres where most serious cases of abuse occur.
He said the present Government should reconsider recommendations made by the 2005 Royal Commission on Police Reforms which were never implemented.
Earlier, Tian Chua launched a pre-booking of his 152-page book which recounts his 30-days in jail last September following his conviction for refusing to leave a police restricted area during the Bersih 3.0 rally in 2012.
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