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Friday, February 10, 2006

UMNO Youth's 'Squatgate-Headgate-Boobsgate' Police!

Everyone including the PM is waiting for the formation of the Independent Police and Misconduct Commission (IPCMC) but UMNO Youth has just said nay. It reckons there’s already enough mechanism to address issues like police abuse or corruption, though I must ask what/where/who/how?

Everytime the police have had their grubby fingers caught somewhere, there would be two solutions - one, the tougher nut to crack like the (self-induced) internationally embarrassing Squatgate case, would be foisted off to an official Inquiry of some sort, like a Commission, to investigate - the other, like the recent Headgate, or Boobsgate where a number of Chinese (nationals) wives of Malaysians were unnecessarily detained, with one having her breasts 'assessed' as excellent by a policeman in the police station, would be to 'tough it out' as the general public would soon forget about them, unless of course the public take them to court.

The above two avenues are not public-friendly, and totally dependent upon the PM's decision. The public need the IPCMC, a concept that has been working effectively overseas, and one actually recommended by our own Royal Commission (the earlier one) into Police conduct. It's incredible that anyone or organisation (except for the police themselves) with an iota of care/concern for public protection and human rights would object to a check-&-balance apparatus in a democratic society. Members of UMNO Youth should hang their heads in abject shame.

But no, UMNO Youth has angrily warned people to stop picking on those law(?) enforcers, who couldn't just help hitting the headlines repetitively in the most scandalous and shameless fashion.

Then, this was where UMNO Youth discredited itself. It swung into conspiracy theory mode by alleging that the IPCMC would be exploited by ‘certain quarters’ to expose the weakness in the country’s administration, though who those 'certain quarters' are, it most conveniently didn’t say.

But c’mon, why bother to protect the reputation of something that's publicly known as 'damaged goods'? Don’t UMNO Youth realise that everyone, including its own members, knows that the country’s administration is screwed up in a number of areas? Just look at the police as an example. Then there is the education ministry! Even the former AG and now SUHAKAM chairman had a few uncomplimentary things to say about the judiciary!

Ah ah, now don't start me off, or I can't stop. But let's just not pretend the nation's civil service, police and armed forces, etc are not what they ought to be in a democratic nation like ours, fortunate enough to be endowed with a ready-made public governance structure but unfortunate enough to be cursed by its abandonment or intermittency.

Then it equates the police to the government (and thus UMNO - anyone object to this relationship?) by saying: “They are poisoning and influencing the people to accept their stand that the police is weak and therefore the government is also weak.”

On the other hand, maybe it knows something that we don’t, that the Royal Malaysian Police is an appendage, not just of the government, but of UMNO too?

But we actually do know! Which perhaps may explain why we have been expecting UMNO Youth, in direct opposition to mainstream Malaysians including ironically the Prime Minister himself, to come out swinging for the police against the establishment of the IPCMC.

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