The nation is gripped with pain as citizens shake their heads in disbelief. The most recent death of a Customs employee - will this episode be the proverbial fourth stone that breaks the camel's back?
Or will Malaysians have to live through numerous more deaths of citizens under detention, under investigation and what nots before Malaysians finaly run into a frenzy?
Or as the authorities have admonished, people must not speculate but go about their everyday business as it does not involve them. And let the authorities do their job and when the answer is finally provided life will return to normalcy.
In the meantime, must also the citizens hear the government's call that people must not listen to opposition parties?
Mr Honorable Prime Minsiter of Malaysia, how many of the citizens have died in the last two decades while under detention; while being investigated by the authorities? And how many foreign nationals have died while in the country?
And in the case of MACC how come you have had two people landing a few floors and found dead?
And while you get your people to figure appropriate answers to these seemingly co-incidental deaths, you may also want to tell the citizens of Malaysia when you or your government can provide honest-before-God long overdue answers to two other questions:
One, how come the Mongolian national who was C4-ed had her immigration details removed?
Two, how on earth and why did the soldiers get the C4 and carry out the brutal killing respectively, of the Mongolian national?
When human lives are lost without acceptable reasons, all civil liberties have been pawned. Any amount of economic progress that a government procliams to have brought about cannot replace the crime of taking away a man's life without accountability.
The latest death at the MACC is surely the last straw. Malaysians must demand the immediate establishment of an Independent Police Complaints and Misconduct Commission (IPCMC) whose remit extends to staff of enforcement agencies. NGOs are demanding the setting up of another royal commission of inquiry but let us not forget that the IPCMC was the recommendation of the Royal Commission on the Police in 2004. It was supposed to have been set up in 2006.
Up until today, the BN government does not have the political will to carry out this recommendation of that royal commission. It means that the BN government has flouted the will of the people and also wasted vast sums of taxpayers’ money.
I had occasion to witness the British Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) in action a few months ago when I was in the UK.
There was a siege by the police on a gunman who had been shooting at people. It was a day-long siege and the gunman was shot by police marksmen in the end. The moment the man was shot, the special force from the IPCC took over and all the police who had taken part in the siege had to withdraw forthwith.
Now, what does it tell us about this IPCC?
Firstly, it is independent. It is independent of the police or enforcement agencies and also independent of the government. The commissioners must be people who have credibility and SEEN to be independent.
Secondly, this IPCC has a Standard Operating Procedure. The moment they know of a death at the hands of the police or enforcement agency, they swing into action IMMEDIATELY to investigate and collect evidence. They do not wait around for a bunch of NGOs to shame them into action, or exhume the victim after months of inactivity as in the Teoh Beng Hock case.
The IPCC is proactive in investigating other complaints against the police and enforcement agencies besides death at the hands of the latter. They also investigate any suspicion of corruption in the police force and enforcement agencies even when there have not received any complaints on this front.
Let me remind the public that apart from these two recent deaths at MACC, deaths in police custody, police shootings, deaths in detention camps have been monitored by Suaram through the years and can be found in our annual Human Rights reports, as follows:
2009 — 7 deaths in police custody, 88 deaths by police shootings;
2008 — 13 deaths in police custody, 44 deaths by police shootings;
2007 — 11 deaths in police custody, 9 deaths by police shootings;
2006 — 14 deaths in police custody, 27 deaths by police shootings;
2005 — 14 deaths in police custody, 12 deaths by police shootings;
2004 — 19 deaths in police custody, 23 deaths by police shootings;
2003 — 23 deaths in police custody, 27 deaths by police shootings;
2002 — 15 deaths in police custody, 54 deaths by police shootings;
2001 — 16 deaths in police custody, 14 deaths by police shootings;
2000 — 7 deaths in police custody, 33 deaths by police shootings.
In March 2007, the government revealed that there had been 95 deaths at the Simpang Rengam detention centre from 2000 to March 2007. In April 1999, the government revealed that there had been 635 deaths by police shootings in the previous 10 years. I might add that official government statistics are often contradictory at different points in time but these are almost definitely an understatement of the actual situation.
Apart from the MACC, other enforcement agencies where untoward incidents and even torture have been alleged recently include the armed forces (case of the missing jet engines), the Securities Commission (when journalists were harassed), the Inland Revenue Board and the Customs.
Only an independent police complaints commission can solve this abhorrent abuse of powers by the police and enforcement agencies. A coroner’s court under the present system will have limited effectiveness because of the quality of the investigation and evidence presented.
If the BN government does not have the political will to cure this malaise afflicting our society, how can they talk about any transformation?
Since Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi took three bullets from Nathuram Godse on January 30, 1948, many have gone on Satyagraha. Most of them were shams.
Only a few of them, like Irom Sharmila who is on an 11-year fast against the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, 1958 in Manipur, show conviction. For the others, it has been so much a political pastime that the average Indian has come to see the Gandhian form of protest as a comic stunt.
Now, an Army truck driver of the 1960s is changing all that. Type ‘A’ on Google search and the system throws up the name Anna Hazare, with more than a million results that correlate with the name. Twitter, Facebook and petition sites are replete with the name. If you think that is but a ‘virtual’ support, go to Jantar Mantar, Delhi, where crowds swell around the 72-year-old crusader on a Satyagraha, sending shivers down the spines of politicians.
And the spineless, who said Hazare was being instigated by some vested interests, are crawling. "Politicians who come to the Satyagraha pandal are being taught how to be modest," said a friend fasting with Hazare, referring to the Uma Bharti incident. Politicians Bharti and Om Prakash Chautala, who apparently tried to take political mileage by paying a visit to Hazare were booed and sent back by the people.
Hazare later apologised to Bharti, saying any politician was welcome to join the fight against corruption, but they can’t find a place on the dais as it was a people’s movement, not be politicised.
The statement, like the man, is an honest one. The spontaneity of public support to his demand for the Jan Lokpal Bill is a testament to that. It’s that fine quality of honesty that turned Kisan Bapat Baburao Hazare into Anna Hazare. It is that simple virtue so scarce in today’s society which propelled the school dropout from Ahmednagar, to a shramdaan pioneer of Ralegan Siddhi, the champion of the right to information and now the crusader for a law to curb corruption.
It is that integrity that sets him apart from the rest who have tried Satyagraha as a drama for political stakes. Chennaiites saw two such one-act plays in 2009 when the war in Lanka was peaking. On March 9, AIADMK leader J Jayalalithaa sat on a fast near the MA Chidambaram cricket stadium demanding immediate ceasefire in Sri Lanka. The same evening, she accepted a glass of fruit juice from no less that Tamil Nadu’s own tiger clone Vaiko to end the fast as air strikes continued to flatten Tamil settlements in the island nation.
Not to be outdone in the tamasha, DMK leader M Karunanidhi went on a ‘surprise fast’ on April 27, when the Eelam Tigers were virtually decimated, raising the same demand. Arriving at dawn, Karunanidhi’s set-makers put in place a cot, two air-coolers and other paraphernalia. The city woke up to the news of the chief minister on a fast. Those who woke up late, however, missed the show, as it got over soon after noon. "Sri Lanka has put an end to hostilities," Karunanidhi proclaimed after the six-hour fast.
Surviving such entertainments, Satyagraha has shown its power through Anna Hazare. Hazare started his fast on Tuesday and the very next day Pawar "dissociated" himself from the group of ministers on corruption.
On Thursday, the Prime Minister agreed to set up a panel with civil society representatives to draft the Lokpal Bill. When a people’s movement gains momentum, history has taught us, rulers can’t just mock and grin. If they do, there could be other forms of protest, some quite contrarian to the Gandhian method, but quite complementary for the cause.
After all, Independence was not a glucose drip the British offered as Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi went on a Satyagraha. There was much blood in the streets. There were Tantya Topes, Chandra Sekhar Azads and Bhagat Singhs who laid down their lives for the Indian Freedom Struggle when the British were grappling with a non-violent fakir who shook the Empire by just going on a fast.
After throwing out the British, India is beginning to battle collectively to root out corruption. If the new age Bapu is insulted, the rulers may well see a few Bhagat Singhs.
THE KHINZIR TOYOL ON LOOSE
video is in bad taste. I mean, how can we make fun of Teoh Beng Hock’s death when we should instead be mourning him?related article read this NAJIB TEOH BENG HOCK was murdered by MACC officers. AS IN ALTANTUYA, The police, MACC, AG and judges are corrupt and partners in crime with UMNO
WATCH: "You could tell he was scoping out the trouble aspects of it."
But eventually the ANWAR loses patience with UMNO.
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Enough is enough. Enough has been written and debated upon about corruption in Malaysia. There was absolutely no light at the end of the tunnel for us, until now. Time has literally stood still on this patient nation that has allowed itself to be taken for the biggest ride of its fifty–three years of independent life by those in governance. Tolerance levels in Malaysia had been very high when it comes to corruption. Scams running to the tune of billions barely make us bat an eyelid anymore and yet within each one of us there is an utmost sense of sheer helplessness that has been taking a vicious form. We have been treading on a short fuse over the last few months as every scam got bigger, every fraudster got braver and every watchdog got blinder. A faint light has streamed through the darkest of thunderclouds that has hovered over us all. Sinister clouds that have been spitting acid rain on raw wounds are now ominously scurrying in panic.
Finally, after years of utter frustration, there is one man, who has emerged and decided to stifle the menace of corruption, by tackling it head on and placing his own neck on the chopping block. because he was meeting a brick wall whichever way he turned,Anwar is the beacon that we were desperately searching for. A beacon that shows us the light and we need to pay heed to this light lest we crash ourselves onto treacherous destiny and drown in our own sea of helplessness.
anwar has made Malaysia notice him. Albeit, just noticing him is not enough, backing him and his cause is critical. His movement needs reinforcement in full scale. What irks me more is the unwillingness of the many who are famous to come out in full and support this seventy . Some pretend he does not even exist and have covered their eyes with blinkers. the faceless are now grouping together on social networking sites
This is an exciting moment for Malaysia, a time when one smells the sweet jasmine that lingers in the heavy air. The bloggers must continue its coverage of ANWAR’s cause at the pace at which it currently is before distractions like the UMNO Vice/Prostitution Media Empire Is Near a Big Infusion of back door Cash their life members UTUSAN,STAR,NST,SUN&THE MALAYSIAN INSIDER HEAD OF OPERATION. READMORE UMNO Vice/Prostitution Media Empire Is Near a Big Infusion of back door Cash Our memories are short lived; we move from one distraction to another and tend to lose focus on pressing and important issues.imperatively needs. To watch a seventy one year old social activist who is already well past the best years of his life, sacrifice whatever is left of his mortality for the sake of this country is nothing short of awe inspiring. Finally there is a man who is making the Government sit up and pay attention to. I wish for ANWAR’s cause to succeed because, right now he is our only hope.
REFORMASI
South Asia has been one of the world’s success stories in terms of rapid economic growth. With India leading the way, South Asia’s poverty rate has fallen from 60 percent in 1981 to 40 percent in 2005. However, during the same period, the number of poor people — those living on less than $1.25 per day — actually increased from 549 million to 595 million over the same period. What’s more, social indicators such as gender parity, secondary education enrollment, and health have not improved in line with growth.
So how do we account for this apparent paradox? Conventional wisdom suggests that growth is sufficient for poverty reduction and social progress, but is this the case in South Asia? Perhaps not, says Ejaz Ghani, Economic Advisor in the World Bank’s South Asian region and author of The South Asian Development Paradox: Can Social Outcomes Keep Pace With Growth, the most recent in the Economic Premise research series.
“The paradox of South Asia is that growth has been instrumental in reducing poverty rates, but poverty rates have not fallen enough to reduce the total number of poor people,” explains Ghani. And as the total number of poor people expands, he is quick to warn, “Human development, particularly education and health, has not kept pace with income growth. And growth has not been gender inclusive.”
Resolving this paradox is crucial since South Asia has more poor people than Africa. In fact, the geography of poverty means that more than 70% of the world’s poor live not in low-income countries, but in middle-income countries — a concentration pattern that is likely to continue into the next decade.
we have political leaders swearing blind that corruption is evil. They, by any standard, even if you want to be charitable, cannot in all honesty be described as morally upright where corruption is concerned.
The same applies to corrupt civil servants: They would dearly love you to believe that they are all valiant corruption fighters.So, it seems logical to ask why do we rate so poorly in the Transparency International Corruption Perceptions Index, year in and year out? Corruption is not just about money changing hands. That is common bribery. Corruption is about abusing entrusted power for private gain.
The latest to join the serried ranks of the country’s star-studded corruption fighters’ gallery is Daim Zainuddin, who, in my humble view, is the last person to lecture us about probity and rectitude.
Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, with his oversized baggage of religious credentials and other feel-good paraphernalia, had me fooled completely and the experience was all the more unpalatably galling because I genuinely like him as a person.Whether he likes me or not, I dare not say. His intentions were I am sure very good, but then as we all know, the road to hell and moral damnation is paved with good intentions.
One lesson we should never ever forget is that politicians as a breed are pathological liars. There are naturally one or two who are reliable and decent.
But seriously, you would probably be better off trusting a cat with a plate of fried fish. Opposition politicians are no exception to this universal truth. So keep an eagle eye on them too, including me, just to be on the safe side.
They cannot abuse power because for now they have no power to abuse. Many will find the temptation irresistible. Name me one honest politician; I will name you 10 wayward Yang Berhormat, together with a clutch of even more crooked Yang Amat Berhormat.
Malaysia cannot achieve wholesome, ethical developed nation status by 2020 or 2099 if Barisan Nasionalpolitics remains stuck in the same groove of careless indifference to basic values and value systems that Malaysia desperate lacks and needs.
Knuckle down to basics and the rest will fall in place. At present the transformation plans sound like so much noise and nothing more because it is inconceivable that they will ever be carried out in a prudent and accountable and sustainable way for the benefit of the long-suffering people of Malaysia.
Discerning Malaysians are not blind to the fact that all the public money being so generously doled out on a daily basis in Sarawak and Selangor is nothing less than advance vote buying.
Money cannot buy the nation’s burning desire for change and change there will be. Try another tack, and save the country from bankruptcy.read more
MONEY CAN’T BUY EQUALITY AN ANTIDOTE FOR A-G GANI PATAIL HIS CORRUPTION AND CRONYISM
Any surprise at a connection being drawn between the 2G chargesheet and Anna Hazare’s fast over the Lokpal Bill is perhaps unwarranted. Anna Hazare’s main contention is that the 42-year-old pending Lokpal Bill should be drafted with inputs from civil society through a joint committee so that the anti-corruption body has teeth and can independently monitor corruption in government. This points to the absence of any truly independent, empowered agency in the country to tackle corruption.
The CBI’s latest chargesheet in the 2G scam investigation, which has been filed under the supervision of the Supreme Court, amply illustrates this. Timid and short on detail, the CBI chargesheet serves more as a lesson for students of law and police academies on how not to make a chargesheet.
For starters, the chargesheet goes out of its way to offer a clean chit to the Prime Minister (4 pages), the attorney general (2 pages) and the Tatas (7 pages). It appears the CBI believes its brief is to defend these three as the accused rather than focusing on its real job of detailing criminal conspiracy, delivering evidence on corruption and filing charges, without favour or prejudice, against those in the government and the private sector who cheated the exchequer.
The 60-page final report does not have a single line to prove corruption nor does it even remotely mention the evidence. Even on Kalaignar TV, it states: “Further investigation regarding these transactions, including custodial interrogation of the accused persons is in progress.” So there you are – a chargesheet on corruption after dragging its feet for 2 years and then being rapped on its knuckles by the Supeme Court — without a single piece of evidence anywhere. One should not rule out the influence of the coming Tamil Nadu elections on the flavour and deliberate shortcomings of this first chargesheet.
Since it is not keen on fulfilling its own mandate of a statutory investigating agency, the CBI has assumed the role of an auditor instead. This is an important move, which helps create a mid-point of Rs 30,984.55 crore between the CAG’s Rs 1.76 lakh crore revenue loss figure, which is accurately based on TRAI recommendations equating 2G spectrum with 3G spectrum, and telecom minister Kapil Sibal’s irreverent and indeed outright frivolous "zero loss" premise.
To do this, the CBI has invented a terminology called “Aggregate Gross Revenue (AGR) per MHz per Year” that has never been used before by anybody — DoT, finance ministry, TRAI or CAG. By citing some documents which are not in the public domain, the CBI takes a parameter used for measuring spectrum charge (recurring quarterly payment by cellular operators) to determine that the auction price for the entry fee would have been Rs 30,984.55 crore. Unsurprisingly, the CBI has failed to provide detailed calculations in support of its new loss figure. The CBI is way out of line in following Sibal’s lead in second guessing the CAG by using this oblique and ineffective parameter.
The CBI has further defied the Supreme Court Order of 16.12.2010 which instructed it to investigate spectrum auctions between 2001 and 2006 and the grant of UAS licences. The CBI has walked over that entire period as if nothing happened – ignoring the Justice Shivraj Patil OMC Report and the multiple statements and evidence provided by the government about the illegal issuance of new UAS licences since 2004 in violation of TRAI’s recommendations and the Cabinet decision of 2003.
None of the companies that were found ineligible in the CAG Report (85 of them) except Unitech have been chargesheeted. After so long, only Unitech’s 22 applications have been evaluated but not the other 63. The same officers who let in Unitech probably let in the others. Yet those officers who let in Unitech are not mentioned in the chargesheet.
The chargesheet also fights to clear attorney general Vahanvati’s name despite the fact that it was he who personally approved the press release of 10.01.2008 which led to the 2G scam. The AG later suggested that the release was tampered with after he had approved it. However, file notings reveal that notwthithstanding the tampering in the last paragraph, the AG approved every decision that went on to become the bedrock of the 2G scam – illegal advancement of the cutoff date, violation of the TRAI Act while modifying the no-cap recommendations and manipulation of first-come-first-served (FCFS).
The CBI has carefully picked on some junior company officials as the prime accused. Is it the CBI’s case that these officials acted without the consent of the owners and promoters? If so, under whose authorization, and with what motive would this be? The CBI repeats the charge of criminal conspiracy between DoT, Swan and Unitech roughly 17 times in the 60 pages but doesn’t provide any insight into how, where and for what consideration such conspiracy occurred. Raja has been provided an exit route to blame his decision on solicitor general (now attorney general) Vahanvati’s advice, while giving the solicitor general an exit by saying that the file was tampered with. This is a perfect situation for the CBI court to dismiss the case against Raja with a little scolding, “The CBI failed to make out the case properly.”
The CBI has also completely failed to show any violation of Government of India (Transaction of Business) Rules – which would have helped nail the illegality, thus proving that the arbitrary decisions were taken for a consideration. If there was no illegal act and the money trail is missing (chargesheet has neither), how will the allegations against Raja, Chandolia and Behura be proved?
So apart from wasting 18 months of the taxpayer’s money since it first filed its FIR in October 2009, it is clear that the CBI, despite the Supreme Court’s supervision, is up to serious mischief. It has accused three obvious government officials (Raja, RK Chandolia and S Behura) and a handful of junior nondescript private company executives with little or no evidence and in fact, left strategic loopholes for this case to either linger endlessly or be dismissed. Unless the CBI springs a surprise in its subsequent chargesheets or the Supreme Court comes down heavily on the CBI for putting together an April Fool’s Day (April 2, 2011) chargesheet, it seems that the stage is set to take the nation for yet another ride by pretending to run a case but in fact, subverting the process of justice by using a shallow and unsubstantiated chargesheet.
Anna Hazare’s agitation is timely, appropriate and critical. The CBI making a joke of the 2G scam investigation despite the Supreme Court’s best efforts shows how desperately India needs anti-corruption laws and institutions like the Lokpal to bring in the changes that Hazare and others in civil society seek. This is not to say that the civil society draft is perfect or that even civil society can control corruption with a magic wand and without accountability to other institutions. Regardless, the frustration and anger that one sees on the streets is because India has witnessed too much compromise on corruption for far too long.
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