‘There was misconduct, reprimand was issued’

Awam admits that it has conducted an inquiry on the sexual allegation but stays silent on claims that it was protecting the sexual offender.

PETALING JAYA: Feminist organisation Awam (All Women’s Action Society) has responded to claims that it is protecting a sexual offender within its own ranks – by not issuing a denial.

Instead, in a written response to FMT over the weekend, Awam president Ho Yock Lin merely shed light on the process of the inquiry into the case.

“A complaint from a former member in 2010 was made against a member,” wrote Ho.

“We conducted a mediation process between the two parties and this was agreed to by both of them and the proceding was confidential.

“The conclusion reached by the panel was that there was a misconduct, and a reprimand was issued to the member concerned,” she wrote.

Notably absent in Ho’s brief response was a denial that the sexual harassment had taken place. Nor did she refute claims that Awam was protecting a sexual offender.

Instead, Ho only denied that the perpetrator had been “promoted” to a key position in Awam.

In the article, FMT had written “but two years later, the angst and pain came flooding back when [the victim] learned that the very same perpetrator had been promoted to a key position on Awam’s board in March 2012”.

Ho wrote: “Contrary to what was written in your article, the member concerned was not promoted to Awam’s key position, it was an election by Awam members and votes were taken during the Awam’s last AGM in accordance with our constitution.”

But that, again, confirms what FMT had written, which is as follows:

“[The victim] was also informed that the perpetrator had been elected by Awam’s members in accordance with the organisation’s constitution, and that prior to the election, a notice of contesting members and the positions contested was duly informed to all Awam members.”

Awam under the spotlight
Awam had first been accused of defending an alleged sexual offender when it deleted all claims on its Facebook page of having elected a “sexual offender” to an office-bearer position within the organisation.

The organisation also blocked its accusers who had posted the allegations, including the victim herself.

In defending its move, Awam had earlier denied outright that a domestic inquiry on the incident had found the accused to have committed sexual misconduct or molestation.

This was despite the fact that in the outcome of the inquiry sent to the victim, the then president of Awam wrote:

“We refer to the complainant dated April 24, 2010, alleging that [the perpetrator] has ‘grabbed the breast of [the complainant] on April 8, 2009, during dinner between the hours of 8pm-9pm, at the Fish Shop in Bangsar Village.”

“We write to inform that after due inquiry, we conclude that the above action did take place and that the [perpetrator] has misconducted herself.”

Awam defines sexual harassment on its website as “receiving any unwanted conduct of sexual nature including sexual comments, fondling, lewd gestures, jokes, e-mails, SMSes, pornographic pictures, coercion and more”.

On this basis, the fact that it acknowledged in the outcome of the inquiry that the perpetrator had grabbed the complainant’s breast, yet later denied on its wall that any sexual misconduct had taken place, suggests a deliberate cover-up – a suggestion that Awam has yet to deny.