Why do people engage in acts of civil disobedience? Civil disobedience happens when someone on purpose defies the law in order to bring public attention to injustices.

Activists who perform civil disobedience are known to be peaceful and are willing to accept legal penalties. Henry David Thoreau, Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr are some high profile believers of civil disobedience.

Thoreau argued that if a government is unjust, sometimes the law the government passes is the problem not the solution. Take for instance, the case of one's refusal to sign the Surat Akujanji. Just because the government has passed a directive for its civil servants to sign a Pledge of Loyalty, it does not mean that the directive is a just one.

And just because many people signed the document without that much protest against its contents, it does not mean that those of us who find some of the contents of the Pledge of Loyalty unacceptable are in err of the law or are less loyal citizens.

Sometimes it takes a small group of people to represent the anguish of the larger group that is victimised by unjust practices. This may be part of how history works.

My husband (Dr Azly Rahman) and I were fired by UUM because we refused to sign the Pledge of Loyalty and we were denied an extension of our non-paid leave upon completion of our studies.

For the past few days both of us have received many emails in support of our struggle against the blatant attempt to subdue the thinking of the masses guised as a pledge to be loyal citizens. Thank you for your support.

Academic freedom clauses

What Malaysian universities need is not a Pledge of Loyalty but a pledge and passage for the revival of its intellectual rigour. Malaysian universities need to have academic freedom clauses added to its mission statement. The university community needs to pledge for academic excellence and academic freedom (with responsibility).

Like in the government, when there are dissenting voices in the universities, accountability of responsibility could be achieved and transparency of administration could be upheld. In addition, academic freedom (with responsibility) will foster multiple perspectives on certain issues/subjects, etc.

Although Malaysia is traditionally known as a collectivistic culture whereby the good of the whole is much more important than the good of the individual, we need to investigate who actually gains from the silencing or attempt at silencing the academicians.

Only then can we unravel the genealogy of the "need" behind the signing of the Akujanji. Sometimes the descending voices are the voices of Reason and Loyalty to an ideal.

Azly and I were fired because we chose to disobey directives. Our disobedience is for a civil reason. This is 2005. When do you think Malaysian academicians can be granted academic freedom?

Revising, or better, discarding the Akujanji, will be a good start. The Surat Akujanji, especially the last two clauses, is a symbol of intellectual oppression.

MUTIARA MOHAMAD was deputy dean of UUM's School of Languages and Scientific Thinking. She and her husband, Azly Rahman, have completed their doctoral studies at Columbia University, New York and are currently educators in the US. She can be contacted at: mutiara.mohamad@gmail.com.