by NGOs
Aliran Monthly Vol 25 (2005): Issue 10

	We ... note that a task force, headed by the Prime Minister and comprising five sub-committees, had been set up subsequently in May 2005 ... but regret that six months have passed without any tangible results ... NGOs

We, the undersigned NGOs and civil society groups,

• support in principle the major findings of the Royal Commission aimed at improving the performance of the Police force so that it sheds its age-old image of being brutal ‘law enforcers’ and projects itself as an institution whose sole purpose is to serve the people in a friendly and cordial manner without being rude, crude, aggressive, unreasonable, brutal or a law unto themselves;


• note that a task force, headed by the Prime Minister and comprising five sub-committees, had been set up subsequently in May 2005 to study how best to implement the 125 recommendations and to categorise them for immediate, medium, and long-term implementation of the Royal Commission’s recommendations but regret that six months have passed without any tangible results, thus eroding the public’s confidence that anything positive could be achieved by these committees;


• further note that Internal Security Ministry deputy secretary-general Datuk Mamzah Md Rus stated that all five sub-committees had reported back to a coordinating committee headed by the ministry’s secretary general (The Star, 17 November) but despite this, nothing seems to be moving;


• are greatly disturbed by several recent incidents involving the Police, including:


• a report made by a lawyer and two others who had witnessed the abuse of a detainee held at the Banting police station on 28 October;


• a report lodged by a blacksmith who claimed that a policeman had banged his head against a wall several times at the Air Itam police station in Penang on 9 November;


• media reports headlining the detention of three female Chinese nationals on 3 November who were stopped at a police road block on the grounds that they possessed fake passports and subsequently detained at the Sungai Buloh police station after they had refused to give a RM500 bribe demanded of them;
  
  
  • and further note with disgust that one of these female Chinese nationals was then slapped and fondled and all three were forced to strip naked and do ear squats by police personnel, who stole their money from them and denied them their personal items sent by their Malaysian husbands some of which were even pilfered, and were finally released on 7 November only after going through this terrible trauma - even though their travel documents were valid as confirmed by the immigration officials;
  
  
  • and indeed view seriously that these three female Chinese nationals were further harassed in the wee hours of the morning by the police at their home at 2.00 am on 22 November, which Datuk Seri Nazri Aziz, Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department, described as ‘clearly harassment’ of those who complained against the police and observed gravely that ‘if this thing goes on, we are really living in a police state’ and therefore this behaviour was ‘completely unacceptable; and


• are aghast by media reports on 25-26 November of the existence of a 70-second video clip which exposed the degradation of a naked woman in a lock-up room who was forced to do ear squats in front of a uniformed policewoman at the Petaling Jaya police station, an action which was clearly in violation of her privacy and human rights;

hereby:

• call for the immediate establishment of the Independent Police Complaints and Misconduct Commission, as recommended by the Royal Commission, in the interest of justice, to look into all these alleged cases of police abuse and to receive further complaints from the public, instead of allowing the police themselves to conduct the investigations which findings will not be fair, objective and through; and


• earnestly urge the PM to order the main task force, which should have completed its studies by now, to implement all the other recommendations contained in the Report, immediately.


• call upon the Prime Minister to immediately repeal the Internal Security Act, the Emergency (Public Order and Prevention of Crime) Ordinance 1969 and all other undemocratic preventive detention laws that are in violation of natural justice and human rights, which facilitate the torture and abuse of detainees and shame us as a nation.

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Endorsed by: Aliran Jamaah Islah Malaysia (JIM) Sisters in Islam (SIS) Malaysians Against Death Penalty and Torture (MADPET) Persatuan Masyarakat Selangor dan Wilayah Perseketuan (PERMAS) Center for Orang Asli Concerns (COAC) Women’s Development Collective (WDC) Youth Section,Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall Women’s Section, Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall Civil Rights Committee, Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall Group of Concerned Citizens (GCC) Monitoring Sustainability of Globalisation (MSN) Kumpulan Kemajuan Masyarakat (KKM), Penang Magick River Penang Office for Human Development (POHD) Tenaganita Transparency International Malaysia IDEAL Pahang Association of Consumers (PAC) Malaysia Youth and Students Democratic Movement (DEMA ) Pusat Janadaya (Empower )

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