Royal commission of deception

ARCHIVES 2009

By adminK On Jul 23, 2009

It is as clear as day light that MACC exists not to wipe out corruption, but to wipe out Pakatan Rakyat – not only in Selangor but all over the country. It is in the realization of this despicable role played by MACC, that the tragic death of an upright and dedicated young man – who was due to get married on the day his life was so cruelly snuffed out – has caused the tolerance of the nation to touch its breaking point.

By Kim Quek

Prime Minister Najib Razak has finally announced the setting up of a Royal Commission of Inquiry (RCI) to assuage the nation’s anger over the tragic death of Teoh Beng Hock in the hands of the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC). But what a let down, and what a deception!

Instead of probing the death of Teoh, the Commission is asked to look into the interrogation methods of the MACC. The absurdity of this move is akin to a school boy caned to death in a school, and the public inquiry is over the disciplinary procedure of the school, not over how and why the boy met his death.

The injustice that befell Teoh Beng Hock – a clear victim of political persecution – has infuriated the nation to boiling point, and yet Najib thinks that an RCI looking into MACC’s methodology would be sufficient to douse the anger and restore confidence in his leadership. What does he take Malaysians for? A bunch of dimwits?

Oh ya, I know what they will say, concurrent with this RCI is an inquest where a magistrate would look into the cause of death. But any one familiar with legal practice can tell you that comparing an inquest to a RCI is like a child vs an adult. An RCI is commissioned by the King, and it is usually made up of senior members of society with distinguished records of competence and integrity, and having wide power to summon for witnesses and evidence, and reporting to the King; whereas an inquest is manned by a junior legal officer whose source of evidence is limited to feedings from the authorities (mainly police) with no power to call for witnesses and other evidences, and forwarding the findings to the attorney general.

Since an RCI is going to be set up in response to public demand to uncover the truth pertaining to Teoh’s death, why create another junior body to take away the principal task – finding out how and why Teoh died – leaving RCI to do a side show? Besides, without allowing RCI to probe into the death, how could it fathom what has gone wrong with the operations of MACC’s? In fact these two tasks are integral and inseparable. Only when the full circumstances surrounding the death are ascertained, can the defects of the system be defined and recommendations made. This is plain common sense, and I can’t imagine a man of Najib’s intelligence cannot comprehend it. That leaves us with no alternative but to conclude that the UMNO leadership is playing a game of hide and seek with the public with respect to this tragedy.

Najib said “the government will do whatever that is necessary to find the truth” and Inspector General Musa Hassan has repeatedly warned the public not to speculate and hurl accusations but to trust the police to carry out a “transparent and professional” investigation, but what has transpired is contrary to these assertions.

The police investigations in particular have been shockingly questionable and unprofessional.

It should be plain from day 1 of the discovery of the body (July 16 ) that Teoh died while under custody and he fell from the window of the MACC’s 14 floor office. That he was never released was verified by his personal articles including his hand phone which were still being kept by MACC when the body was found and the fact that he could not have walked off the office on his own as implied by MACC as he did not have the electronic card to open the door. That he fell through the office window was evidenced from the 14th floor window latch which was found next to Teoh’s body.

Then why didn’t the police seal the office, seize all relevant documents including notes of interrogation, dust for finger prints particularly those at the window on the very first day (July 16), as death by foul means clearly could not be excluded.

Despite evidence of Teoh’s fall from the building while under custody, why did Selangor police chief Khalid Abu Bakar say that he did not suspect foul play and classified the case as “sudden death” – even before autopsy was performed? Didn’t this presumption betray patronization of a fellow law-enforcing agency?

Why did the police forensics personnel visited the crime scene only on Day 4 (July 19) to take evidence, removing articles such as documents, CCTV records, window latch etc, knowing that vital clues could have been erased, tampered with or removed in the intervening 3 days? Didn’t this reflect a lack of seriousness?

Why did the police deny repeatedly to assemblyman Ronnie Liu until day 4 that it had Teoh’s hand phone, when in fact the phone has been in its possession since day 1? What was the police secretly keeping the phone for so many days for?

The body was discovered at 1:30 pm and Teoh’s boss assemblyman Ean Yong Hian Wah arrived at the MACC office at 5 pm asking to see Teoh, but the personnel therein including Selangor police chief Khalid Abu Bakar did not entertain EanYong for more than an hour. Why kept the news from Ean Yong for so long? Why wasn’t Teoh’s family informed in the first instant? Was this long duration of silence a needed interval to complete certain preparatory work before the bad news was announced to the world? Shouldn’t such improper conduct give rise to suspicious imputations?

The autopsy was completed on day 2 (July 17), why is the police still keeping the findings under lid?

As for MACC, questions galore that suggest criminal liability over Teoh’s death in the backdrop of a political conspiracy to sabotage the Selangor Pakatan state government with corruption prosecutions. Examples of these are:

1. Why did director of investigations Shukri Abdul lie that Teoh was released at 3:45 am and that he had no idea how Teoh’s body landed on the fifth floor balcony, when in fact Teoh was never released and he fell off a window in the office? Was there a necessity to lie if there was no criminal liability on the part of MACC?

2. Why was Teoh tortured in a marathon interrogation that stretched into the early hours of morning when he was not a criminal suspect but only a witness assisting in an investigation over a hearsay allegation of misappropriation of a paltry RM 2,400 by his boss Ean Yong? Ean Yong was among a group of seven Pakatan assemblymen selected for investigation for unspecified suspicion of miss-using their annual allocations of half a million ringgit each. In contrast, Pakatan complaints against BN assemblymen for having dubiously spent their entire annual allocations within the short period of two months shortly before the last election in Mar 8, 08 have been met with silence for more than a year.

3. Why have Pakatan leaders been systematically hounded over dubious petty allegations while MACC routinely playing deaf and dumb over multi-million and even multi-billion scandals of corruption and abuse of power by Barisan Nasional leaders? Why kept silent over the RM 12.5 billion PKFZ scandal despite having received numerous reports of complaints from Pakatan since 2004? Why took no notice over the recently exposed mansion of former Selangor Menteri Besar Khir Toyo reputedly worth RM 24 million which was well beyond his accumulated official income? Why took no action on Khir for the numerous reports of corruption and abuse of power uncovered by the Pakatan state government since the last election?

Let us resolve that the fascist power be not tolerated henceforth. Let us all stand up for justice for Teoh Beng Hock.