After Karpal’s sedition conviction, IGP Khalid wants my “scalp”, knock me out of Parliament and even jailed for sedition?
--Lim Kit Siang
The Inspector-General of Police, Tan Sri Khalid Abu Bakar, probably hopes to get the second scalp of a DAP leader to be jailed and be disqualified and knocked out of Parliament for conviction of sedition – targeting me after Karpal Singh’s most unwarranted conviction for sedition and RM4,000 fine which would have ejected Karpal from Parliament if he is still alive and his appeal against conviction or sentence had not been overturned.
I was surprised when I first learned that the Police was coming after me under the Sedition Act, although I was nonplussed as to what seditious statement I had made to warrant a police investigation against me under the Sedition Act – especially when the Police had been infamously passive and notoriously inactive when there had been a crescendo of seditious utterances and threats by extremist individuals and NGOs inciting racial and religious hatred, including May 13 threats about racial riots uttered at least thrice this year alone!
Malaysians must commend the Malaysian Police for having the outstanding qualities not to be found in other police forces in the world, i.e. its enormous ability to turn the blind eye to flagrant criminality right in their faces when committed by certain privileged groups of people but extraordinary ability to discern crime or sedition when they don’t exist when another targeted group of people is involved!
In a buka puasa event last night, Khalid announced that the police will record a statement from me for my recent comment on the fifth death anniversary of Teoh Beng Hock (TBH) that Beng Hock had been murdered and that the killers are still at large.
Khalid said what I said could be seditious and I will be investigated under the Sedition Act.
He said: “Do not try to create something which is not true but can cause the people to be angry and suspicious.”
How does the Inspector-General of Police know that it is not true that Beng Hock had been murdered or killed at the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) premises in Shah Alam five years ago on 16th July 2009?
I would commend Khalid to read the Report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry (RCI) on TBH, for anyone reading it would find that the Report was screaming “Murder! Murder! Murder!” if not “Manslaughter! Manslaughter! Manslaughter!” although the RCI Report evaded the issue altogether in its conclusion with the finding that TBH was driven to commit suicide by aggressive and continuous questioning by MACC officers!
Is there such a “animal” as “forced suicide” which is not homicide or murder?
The TBH RCI found that MACC officers had acted with impunity in utter disregard of the law, resulting in TBH’s death, and then conspired to cover up the truth and commit the crime of perjury at the RCI public hearing with false evidence.
Can Khalid explain why the police had not launched investigations into the MACC officers implicated in TBH’s death, whether under sections 304 and 304A of the Penal Code, namely for culpable homicide not amounting to murder and for causing the death of TBH by negligence, respectively, or even under Section 302 for murder?
What was a great travesty of justice was the MACC statement on the fifth anniversary of the death of TBH on July 16 that the three MACC officers implicated in the death of Teoh Beng Hock by the RCI had been cleared of indiscipline by the MACC special investigation team comprising its disciplinary board and the complaints committee.
This was a most shocking and scandalous announcement – as not only the memory of Teoh Beng Hock and TBH family, but decent Malaysians as a whole deserve full explanation how the three MACC officers implicated in TBH’s death could be cleared of indiscipline by the MACC special investigation team, without having to suffer any penalty whatsoever!
Is the life of a person, who is not an important personage in the corridors of power in Malaysia, so cheap that it could be snuffed out in a most criminal manner without anyone having to suffer any retribution – like the 537 passengers and crew from over 10 countries whose lives were snuffed out in an instant in the two air disasters within five months, MH 370 and MH 17?
Anybody who revisits the Report of the TBH RCI can only feel outraged and scandalized by the announcement of the clearing of the three MACC officers implicated in TBH’s death.
Although the RCI Report did not pinpoint Beng Hock’s killers, it was clearly established at the RCI that there was a conspiracy of “blue wall of silence” among the MACC officers to “cover up” what actually transpired at the MACC resulting in Beng Hock’s death, with the RCI publicly condemning the MACC Selangor officers (except for two “brave” witnesses) as a pack of liars who blatantly told lies and perjured at the RCI.
But now, the MACC trio implicated in TBH’s death had been completely exonerated and not “penalised” in any manner by the triumvirate of police, AG’s chambers and the MACC.
The Conclusion of the TBH RCI Report referred to the criminality of the MACC officers in “’a blue wall of silence’ based on brotherhood ties among those (MACC) officers” resulting in “the untruths spouted by the MACC officers to cover up the nefarious activities that took place on the 15th and the 16th”, i.e the events leading to the death of TBH.
Para 363 of the Report of the TBH RCI is most revealing:
“363. But what is most saddening and regrettable is that the operation that the Selangor MACC embarked upon led to the death of TBH, a promising young man in the prime of life who had everything to look forward to. His family was robbed of a son and brother, his fiancée of a husband and his then unborn child of a father. We can feel the pain and anguish that they must have suffered and continue to suffer as a result of the callous machinations and attitudes of the MACC officers who were involved in the operation. We express our heartfelt sympathies on the loss that the family of TBH and his fiancée and son have had to bear and continue to bear. We can only hope that time will assuage their pain.”
The TBH RCI was established not “to feel the pain and anguish” of TBH family or to convey condolences to TBH family for the death of TBH but to ascertain, among other things, TBH’s killers and to act against the MACC and its officers for their “nefarious activities” and “callous machinations” resulting in TBH’s death.
Did the police follow up on the Report of the TBH RCI to investigate the MACC personnel implicated in TBH”s death despite the damning findings of the RCI on their “nefarious activities” resulting in TBH’s death, and if not, why not?
Can Khalid answer these questions about the police conduct on TBH’s death?
“The
government had a good intention when it set up the Royal Commission on
the management of the police force eleven years ago, but when the panel
recommended a viable solution to the problem of custodial deaths, the
government wavered on its implementation,” observed the lawyer who acts
for estranged spouses who have had their children caught in custodial
disputes converted to another religion.
“Confusion
is created and skepticism about government and governance is bred such
that matters are left hanging in a grey zone where people are encouraged
to become cynical about politicians,” said Kulasegaran (left).