Activist Fahmi Reza To Be Charged Tomorrow BUT It’s Not Over The Viral ‘House of Balak’ Illustration

By Karissa Lund  •  in News
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(source: FMT)

According to Malay Mail, artist-activist Fahmi Reza is expected to be charged at the Sessions Court on Thursday (10 Feb).

His lawyer Rajsurian Pillai confirmed yesterday (8 Feb) that the proceeding would be conducted at the Kuala Lumpur Courts Complex.

“I am allowed to disclose that the police called Fahmi to attend court to face charges this Thursday at 9am. Any other information will be released by my client,” he said.

However, while many assume that the charges will be over the infamous “House of Balak” artwork, JUICE has reached out to Fahmi who told us that it is regarding a whole other illustration. While Fahmi himself does not know which posts of his will be charged, the artist has narrowed it down to two illustrations and has been teasing his followers through his social media accounts.

Take a look:

ICYMI, Fahmi had been called to Bukit Aman on 25 Jan over a social media post that allegedly depicted an edited image of the Pahang Coat of Arms with the words “House of Balak”.

The illustration was posted on 3 Jan and the title also closely resembles Pahang Royal’s curated social media accounts that go by ‘House of Pahang’. The artwork immediately went viral on social media following the massive flooding in December last year and in the wake of allegations of extensive logging in Pahang.

Hence, many assumed it was about the “House of Balak” design, however, the artist seems to have ruled this out in his ‘teaser’ post as he marked the design with an “X”.

In a media statement, Bukit Aman Criminal Investigation Department (CID) director Abdul Jalil Hassan had said the activist was called to have his statement recorded at the Classified Criminal Investigation Unit, prosecution/legal division of the CID.

(source: @kuasasiswa Twitter)

It is learnt that investigations were carried out according to Section 4(1) of the Sedition Act 1948 for acts with seditious tendency and Section 233 of the Communications and Multimedia Act 1998 for misuse of network facilities or services.

So far, Fahmi reacted by creating a Twitter thread regarding what he was asked by the authorities and even posting his trip to the police station:

Guess we will have to wait until tomorrow to figure out which artwork will Fahmi be charged for…

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