Over the last two weeks, we’ve reported on Perlis’s Arau UMNO MP, Shahidan Kassim, having been at the center of serious accusations of not only having molested a 15-year-old girl, but also strong-arming her family to withdraw the police report they filed on the matter.
Now, back from an ill-timed umrah in Saudi Arabia, during which the courts were looking for the former minister so as to charge him, Shahidan presented himself in a Kangar, Perlis court this morning to finally face the molestation charges. An entourage of 30 friends and family in tow accompanied the MP.
Initially declaring himself just a “misunderstood” man, he had previously gone to Malaysia’s central police headquarters, Bukit Aman, to answer to some pretty serious allegations after authorities re-opened the case that he was alleged to have tried to sweep under the rug.
Serious stuff you might want to stick around town for, but not for Shahidan, who used the days after police questioning to travel abroad on his pilgrimage. Social media users openly questioned the trip’s timing:
We had to admit, it was a strange, and ultimately ill-advised decision, after a Perlis court was looking for him last Friday to answer to the molestation charges they now wanted to slap with.
With the MP in absentia, a warrant was issued, and had he not appeared in court this Monday morning, police would have had to unceremoniously arrest him. Messy.
#NSTFlash: Arau Member of Parliament Datuk Seri Shahidan Kassim has pleaded not guilty to sexually molesting a 15-year-old girl. The Kangar Sessions Court has set bail at RM25,000 and set Jan 8, 2019, for remention of the case. pic.twitter.com/OGQLZKMs4s
— New Straits Times (@NST_Online) November 12, 2018
Shahidan has plead not guilty to molesting the 15-year-old girl; we’ll keep you posted on the case’s developments.
Reader Interactions