KUALA LUMPUR, March 22 — Umno leaders had actually prevented a Universiti Malaya student from being beaten up by the so-called "public”, Umno’s Datuk Lokman Noor Adam claimed today.

The Umno supreme council member admitted that he grabbed and ripped up a placard featuring a clown caricature of former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak that was held by one of the six or seven students protesting against Najib’s meet-and-greet at the university.

"When I was ripping the picture, the DAP supporter just now tried to stop me,” Lokman said in a statement.

"He was then stopped and pulled by several individuals at the scene of the incident. The artist should have been grateful because there were several Umno leaders at the scene of the incident who stopped him from being beaten up by the public angered by their rudeness,” he claimed.

Universiti Malaya Association of New Youth (UMANY) president Wong Yan Ke told Malay Mail that Umno supporters had strangled and slapped him during a scuffle in front of Najib’s meet-and-greet at a restaurant in Universiti Malaya.

Pictures also appeared to show Lokman trying to slap a student in the fracas.