KUALA LUMPUR - MALAYSIAN activists who threatened to strip naked and 'stalk' a state chief minister over a hike in public housing rents will now remain clothed after a deal was reached.

Badrul Hisham Mohammad Hanafiah, acting president of the Malaysian People's Reform Movement (Reformis), said a deal was struck with central Selangor Chief Minister Khalid Ibrahim to keep rentals at the same rate.

'We accept the Selangor government's decision in good faith and hope such a lapse in administration would not recur,' he told state news agency Bernama late on Monday.

The group, whose members are men aged between 33 and 50, had threatened to follow Khalid round the state and strip naked in front of him to show how the rental hikes 'would take even the clothes off our backs'.

They were protesting the state government's decision in July to more than double the rent of low-cost housing in Malaysia's opposition-controlled Selangor state, from 124 ringgit (S$49.30) a month.

Conservative Islamic groups in this Muslim-majority nation had slammed the nude protest plan.

The hardline Islamic party PAS, which is part of the opposition alliance, criticised the plans last month, with its spiritual leader Nik Abdul Aziz Nik Mat saying only 'uncivilised' people would resort to such an act. -- AFP