Cheras Umno division chief Syed Ali Alhabshee has lashed out at press freedom groups which condemned the police arrests against news portal The Malaysian Insider .

Taking aim at the Centre for Independent Journalism (CIJ) , Syed Ali said the NGO should instead educate media practitioners to be ethical and factual in their reporting.

“Why does CIJ only look at the (police) arrests but does not care about hudud or the position of the Conference of Malay Rulers?

“We can already figure out what is their intention,” he said in a blog posting today.

Instead, he said people should be supporting the police.

Police arrested five staffers from TMI and The Edge Media Group in the last 24 hours over the news portal’s report that the Conference of Malay Rulers had rejected hudud.

“Don’t blame the police when the editors of TMI are arrested, if they dare to make false reports, then they must dare to face the consequences,” declared Syed Ali.

Umno lodged at least two police reports over the news article, including by its Youth chief Khairy Jamaluddin and Kedah Youth chief Saiful Hazizy Zainol Abidin.

In the March 25 article, TMI said the proposed amendments to make hudud possible was presented to the Conference of Rulers but shot down.

This was subsequently denied in a statement purportedly by the Conference of Rulers, which turned out to be false.

The keeper of the rulers’ seal later lodged a police report over the fake statement and also denied that the conference had dealt with the hudud issue.

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Yes, the police chief has truly gone bonkers