KUALA LUMPUR – Political cartoonist Zulkiflee Anwar Haque, better known as Zunar, has been blacklisted from entering Sarawak.
However, Zunar said he was ultimately granted entrance into the state capital Kuching for three days, although the reasons behind his blacklisting remained unknown.
“No specific reason was given. (I was) detained for three hours here,” he said in a Facebook post.
“After negotiating with the Kuching immigration, I was finally permitted entrance for only three days.”
Zunar had flown to Kuching to teach a cartoon-drawing workshop scheduled for today and tomorrow at La Promenade Mall.
With permission to enter Sarawak for three days, he said the drawing workshop would proceed as scheduled.
Zunar also mentioned his previous detention at Kuala Lumpur International Airport by immigration authorities in June 2016, and that he was barred from leaving Malaysia for two years.
This was after he held a cartoon exhibition in Geneva, Switzerland, and allegedly tarnished Malaysia’s image by participating in it.
Zunar filed a legal challenge to his travel ban, which was lifted in 2018, shortly after Pakatan Harapan took over the federal government following the 14th general election.
Known for his satirical comics that depict former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak and his wife Datin Seri Rosmah Mansor as corrupt individuals, Zunar has been charged with sedition, had his books seized by the government and his local exhibitions disrupted. – December 9, 2023