Four things Najib can do on Teoh’s ‘Seventh Day’

The seventh day after death is very important in Chinese custom. It’s believed that the soul of the deceased may return to visit his or her home in the seventh evening. It’s the time to offer comfort so the deceased may rest in peace and the living may move on.

By Wong Chin Huat, The Malaysian Insider

Teoh Beng Hock does not need flowers from PM Datuk Seri Najib Razak, note attached in Chinese: “Heaven envies talent”.  Don’t blame Heaven for his death. Some earthly beings have caused his death after a torturous 11-hour interrogation.

Teoh’s death is anything but an “act of god”. It is neither natural nor purely accidental.

He died after a lengthy interrogation without his counsel present. This is an established fact now, which needs no any commission or panel to verify.

It is unlikely that the MACC officers did not find out during the marathon interrogation that Teoh was to tie the knot with his fiancée the very next day.

Yet, they kept drilling the bridegroom-to-be from 5 pm to 3.45 am.

MACC chief Ahmad Said had the guts to disown responsibility for Teoh’s untimely death even before the body was buried.

Whatever you say about it, however you spin it, no official denial, no fanning of ethnic sentiments, and no white-wash can wipe off the anger and grief most Malaysians feel for his family, his fiancée and their first child she now carries.

Not “act of God”, but political death

Teoh is not only the first person harmed during MACC investigations — more precisely, torturing session if the shocking revelation by another witness Tan Boon Hwa is true — he is the first state officer who has died while under the custody of a federal agency, in what can be perceived as an extension of federal-state intergovernmental power struggle.

Most importantly, Teoh’s demise is the first political death involving a government institution since the Memali incident in 1985.

For all criticisms against Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, while under his reign, many Malaysians had suffered political persecution including physical assaults, and many others had died in police custody, no one has died in the custody or hand of a law enforcement agency because of politics.

What never occured in the past 24 years happened on the 105th day of Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak.

So, Najib’s 1 Malaysia has seen its first political death even before he completes his third month.

Would Teoh be the last? Would people die in the hand of other law enforcement agencies like Jabatan Pengangkutan Jalanraya (JPJ) next time around, as a Pakatan Rakyat leader has rightly asked?

Najib’s responsibility on Teoh

But is Najib responsible for Teoh‘s death? Yes, in two unfortunate senses.

First, MACC is parked under his Prime Minister Department. It is not an independent agency answerable to Parliament and has not acted independently, the department has to take all the blame for whatever misconduct of MACC, from its selective investigation to torturing interrogation.

Second, Najib’s first-100-day reform had completely ignored any reform of political and public institutions, including MACC which has a history of violence. In January this year, just after the outrageous death of Kugan, a Halimi Kamaruzzaman complained that he was punched by three MACC officers in the head, stomach and shoulder. During his four-day remand by MACC, he was also forced to strip and threatened to have his private part burned with cigarettes.

Antithetical to the communalist spinning now by Umno newspapers, the last victim of MACC before Teoh is a Malay and in fact an UMNO Division leader.

Halimi claimed that MACC wanted him to implicate Norza Zakaria, a close associate of Khairy Jamaluddin, in money politics in Umno.  Unsurprisingly, Khairy was the first Umno and BN politician to call for a Royal Commission of Inquiry on Teoh’s death.

Malaysians would have been equally angered and saddened if Halimi had fallen off the MACC’s Pahang headquarters where he was detained after his ordeal, which he compared to the torture suffered by Iraqi inmates in the Abu Ghraib prison.

In that sense, all Malaysians — not only Najib — are guilty on Teoh’s death for not ensuring that Halimi would be the last victim of MACC’s alleged misbehavior.

Putting aside his role in the MACC investigations on Selangor Pakatan Rakyat lawmakers which led to Teoh’s death, now Najib must ensure justice for Teoh and the safety of all Malaysians from potential institutionalised sadism and barbarism.

Otherwise, his 1 Malaysia slogan will become a cruel joke on Malaysia which would make all Malaysians want to cry.

After all, what good is greater freedom to make money when you can be humiliated, tortured and die mysteriously anytime in the custody of a law enforcement agency?

And what good is inter-ethnic equality if that means all Malaysians, whether you are Indian, Malay or Chinese, stand an equal chance of suffering torture and dying prematurely?

READ MORE HERE: http://www2.themalaysianinsider.com/