Anwar Ibrahim & the police - from black eye to bad back!

One of my saddest experiences on the web was when my good matey Chris lambasted me for being allegedly happy with the police arrest of Anwar Ibrahim in my post Arresting Anwar Ibrahim - Game of brinksmanship?

Even he, with whom I had shared a few many jokes against SIL in happier years, condemned me for going too far in my ‘hatred’ for Anwar.

I just wonder for the life of me how that post could be read to convey my alleged ‘hatred’? If I may remind readers I had also predicted:

"No charge has yet been laid against him and it may well be that the police will be forced to release him after 24 hours – unless of course …….. something develops."

Well, hasn’t my prediction been true as proven by Malaysiakini news Anwar freed on police bail?

Unsurprisingly, the police had f* up somewhat – two things sprang to mind:

(1) They kept Anwar overnight – was that necessary?

This gives credence to Anwar’s claim that it was a vindictive action against him because he had lodged a police report against the AG and the IGP over his treatment during his original trial – see Malaysiakini news article Overnight detention a case of 'vendetta'!

Anwar enlarged his claim to embrace a host of police actions against him, as if there was no sodomy allegation lodged by Saiful Azlan against him.

He averred: "It appears that the events of the last few days, the nature of my unwarranted arrest, my overnight incarceration which was actually absolutely unnecessary, were an act of personal vengeance against me. They should not use this as a personal vendetta against me."

If you had read the pro Anwar supporters, even that of my good matey Chris, you would be able to tell, that to them, as far as the person of Anwar was/is concerned, Anwar can do no wrong, somewhat similar to the UMNO ‘close-one-eye’ case – so really, what's the difference?

… hmmm, theirs have been a behaviour succinctly explained in an article by Raja Petra Kamarudin (RPK) titled The cult called PKR, where he wrote:

"That is the trouble with PKR. They dabble in cult personalities. When you are the current hot favourite, the flavour of the day, even your fart smells sweet ... "

"The PKR crowd is one emotional group of people. I suspect that if Anwar was to order them to commit mass suicide they might just do so."

How true!

Some don’t even bother to read what I had actually written in my posts before they came out swinging to get me, as an example, like Mr Phua Kai Lit ;-)

Now, did the police have a right to arrest him the way they did?

Anwar's supporters stated that the police, in arresting Anwar at 1 pm, had acted in bad faith by not giving the man a reasonable chance of a whole hour before the deadline of 2 pm.

They argued that there was nothing to say he should have gone straight from the ACA office to the police station. His return from Putrajaya to Bukit Segambut didn’t mean he couldn’t get back to the police station in Putrajaya by 2 pm. There was plenty of time for him to do just that.

In fact the Star reported Anwar saying the same thing:

He also took to task Federal CID director commissioner Datuk Mohd Bakri Zinin for telling Malaysians a "blatant lie" by saying that they had the reason to believe that Anwar was not going to show up at the police headquarters at 2pm on Wednesday as promised.

"I gave my commitment that I would come. My lawyer had just spoken to DSP Jude Pereira at 12.45pm and assured him that I would show up on time," he said, adding that he was ambushed 5 minutes after that call.

Anwar said he was going home for a quick lunch after which he planned to proceed to the police headquarters.

But of course neither he nor his supporters mention the fact that he failed to turn up on Monday as he had promised earlier. This fact was not considered by his supporters.

In my post Arresting Anwar Ibrahim - Game of brinksmanship? I had blogged:

"He merajuk by claiming that the police had acted unprofessionally in 'intimidating and harassing' his staff and family while attempting to serve an order under Section 111 of the Criminal Procedure Code on Sunday."

"I didn't buy his bullsh*t because the police had to do so, ie. serve that order ....."

In blatantly refusing to turn up at the police station on Monday as he promised, he had (either unwittingly or deliberately) transmitted to the police the message of “C’mon, lai lah, ayo mari lah, come catch me if you dare!”

Many had viewed that defiance as a game of brinksmanship.

Yes, I know our police are nasty bastards but in this case it was not the police who had first acted in bad faith. It was Anwar Ibrahim who made them lose faith in his ‘promise to turn up’!

No doubt police hormones were flying - anak jantan, anak jati and anak jambalaya, I think they were out to get him, to show him that he had to front up, no matter who he is.

In a way Anwar had been right that there was police vindictiveness, but I suspect it had more to do with his defiant recalcitrancy rather than his police report against the AG and IGP.

(2) And the dumbos in blue had been stupid enough to make him sleep on the concrete floor. They just had to martyr-ize him. Was that necessary, considering he's hardly a young buck!

His bad back, which I thought had already been cured by that very special operation only capable of being done in Germany, has ‘returned’ not just to give him a bad back but a bad name to the Police.

Once it was a black eye, now it’s a bad back!

But the fact that the cops dare not take his DNA without his expressed permission has been clearly indicated in Malaysiakini news article Police mull court action to get DNA, a sign they have been careful in dealing with this high profile person. Even Deputy IGP Ismail Omar confessed that the police will be exploring legal avenues to acquire a sample of Anwar Ibrahim’s DNA.

But this wariness should have been exercised in every dealings with Anwar, and not just in obtaining his DNA.

Anyway too late leow, for undoubtedly Anwar Ibrahim has reaped enough public sympathy to get him going for a while.

His target date of 16 September 2008 is just a mere two months away, and his party deputy president has already boldly claimed, as reported in The Star, that his arrest has been a move to thwart the Opposition’s takeover of the country – wow!