Cynthia Gabriel, executive director of the anti-graft group, C4, said that structural and law reforms need to take place first to let civil groups work freely without facing any government pressure.
“It is correct that we need to get out from our comfort zones and big cities to rural areas to educate the people on various issues.
“But we want to see laws are in place first and there’s a friendly environment for us to go out to rural areas.
“It would have be bizarre to go down to Felda voters to teach them what is political funding, without any restrictions, during the time of the last government,” she said in response to PPBM Supreme Council member Wan Saiful Wan Jan‘s comments.
Earlier today, Saiful, who was part of think tank group IDEAS, said that civil groups should go out of their “Bangsar bubble”, or comfort zone, to outskirts such as Pendang, Kedah, to educate voters on the importance of political funding.
Speaking at a forum on “Political Financing Reforms”, organised by the G25 group of retired senior civil servants, the former PPBM candidate for Pendang had said that persuading voters in urban areas was not good enough.
“We are not touching the realities on the ground,” Saiful had said.
Cynthia also said the previous government clamped down on NGOs for what they were doing.
She added they could not function well as they were constantly being “targeted”.
“We cannot be called up every time by the police for our work, like distributing leaflets, and be questioned.
“How are we supposed to focus on our ground work then?” Cynthia asked.