The Malaysian police must act tougher against criminals

By MT Webmaster Last updated May 26, 2015

The people are not happy and if the police do not take strong action then Barisan Nasional may lose the next election. So can we see more dead bodies and less piracy and kidnappings please? Malaysians can no longer tolerate this runaway crime wave.

NO HOLDS BARRED

Raja Petra Kamarudin

Some have commented that my articles are too cheong hei (longwinded) and that most Malaysians are too lazy to read anything longer than 500 words. That is probably true and is also probably why many leading international publications limit their word-count to just 850 words and the essays for your Oxford course to just 500 words and the final essay to just 1,000 words.

Anyway, maybe today I will, for the first time, write a very short article. And my article is regarding piracy and kidnappings.

Malaysians are upset about the problem of piracy and kidnappings and they want the government to do something about the matter or else step aside and allow the opposition to take over.

I am not sure how if Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail takes over as Prime Minister she is able to reduce or eliminate piracy and kidnappings because the opposition has not explained this part yet.

Anyway, I remember back in the 1980s and 1990s when the Malaysian police used to shoot dead criminals in the midst of committing a crime or even while just on the way to commit a crime and even before the crime had been committed yet.

That no doubt reduced crime somewhat (because the criminal population got reduced drastically) and it also saved the country a lot of money and a lot of wasted man-hours prosecuting these criminals who always seemed to get off anyway because they employed good lawyers.

I remember one friend from the US who commented that he had great respect for the way Malaysia handles the crime problem and gets rid of criminals and he added that he wished the US would do the same.

Anyway, since the 1990s we have become very human rights and civil liberties conscious and we no longer shoot dead people who are committing crimes and who just happen to look suspicious. And now Malaysians are most unhappy about the matter.

Maybe we should go back to the days of the 1980s and 1990s when the police were encouraged to shoot first and ask questions later, if the person shot happens to be still alive and can talk, of course. Those were the days when it was safe to walk the streets or eat in restaurants without any worries.

Of course, sometimes in that shootout innocent bystanders are also shot dead (in one case a pregnant woman was shot dead and the baby came out of her stomach, also dead) but this is what the Americans call ‘collateral damage’.

(There you are, only 464 words).

Raja Petra Kamarudin RPK