Tele-electronic Kempetai in Selangor

In the Malay Mail Online, Azrul Mohd Khalib, a MM Online reader, wrote 'There is nothing to be afraid of, if you are not doing anything wrong’.

Azmin Ali, MB Selangor and advisor to HRH Sultan of Selangor  on matters such as religion, JAIS, etc

Those were NOT his words but the words of the JAIS director, Haris Kasim, who said it as a pathetic excuse to defend a new JAIS mobile application for Muslims to spy on and report on fellow Muslims for alleged syariah offences.

It would seem Haris Kasim and JAIS have gone to all that trouble to create a telecommunicative application to endow Malaysian Muslims with a modern tele-electronic Kempetai.

Do you younger Malaysians, especially those who haven't read our horrendous experience under the Japanese occupiers during WWII, know who the Kempetai was?

Wikipedia tells us (just extracts):

The Kempeitai (憲兵隊, "Military Police Corps") was the military police arm of the Imperial Japanese Army from 1881 to 1945. It was not a conventional military police, but more of a secret police. [...]

The Kempeitai ran extensive criminal and collaborationist networks, extorting vast amounts of money from businesses and civilians wherever they operated. They also ran the Allied prisoner of war system, which often treated captives with extreme brutality.

The Kempeitai also carried out revenge attacks against prisoners and civilians. For example, after Colonel Doolittle's raid on Tokyo in 1942, the Kempeitai carried out reprisals against thousands of Chinese civilians and captured airmen.

All these actions together amounted to genocide on a gigantic scale, and—including Unit 731's vivisection campaign—some of the worst atrocities committed during World War II.

Well, we needn't go into all the Kempetai's vile, barbaric and heinous crimes, which were far worse than what the Gestapo and SS did in Europe, but note those of their works like '... collaborationist networks' which is exactly what JAIS is promoting with its new application.

During WWII in Europe the Gestapo and SS also ran similar spying networks where children were encouraged to spy on their own parents, let alone neighbours.

Note the term 'spying network' and not 'spy network', where 'spying network' would be similar to what was proposed by JAWI in 2006 for forming snoop teams to peep on Muslims on such 'sins' as khalwat, adultery etc.

Then-PM AAB was so incensed by the invasive-to-privacy proposal that he told JAWI to cease and desist, stating the Cabinet's official policy would always be to deny any such proposals in the future or in any State.

This was in the wake of an early rebuke by the Cabinet to Mohd Ali Rustam, then Malacca's Chief Minister, on a similar peeping Toms' scheme. In 2005 Rustam was ordered to bugger off with that shameful disgraceful podah peeping proposal.

Then the Cabinet was determined that no group would ever be permitted to spy on people on so-called religious moral grounds. Bravo to AAB.But what happened to Selangor in 2016" Why has Azmin Ali been so quiet? Isn't he the religious advisor to HRH?

Well, on this latest JAIS nonsense, it has exposed MB Azmin Ali for what he is, in total contrast to the sterling words of then-PM AAB.

Radzi Sheikh Ahmad, then Minister in the PM AAB’s Department revealed that Cabinet ministers have been pissed off with the nerve of some clown(s) in forming such a sneaky, shameless, sinister, scungy, snooping squad right under their noses.

To say this again, why then is Azmin Ali as MB of Selangor allowing such evil oppressive invasion of privacy on Selangoreans. And Azmin, please don't hide under HRH's sarong lah!

Anyway, what Haris Kasim of JAIS is promoting or defending should make Muslims become more (MM Online words) ... worried by the increasing need to peer into people’s households, living rooms and bedrooms.

What is worse, is that the violation of privacy is consistently followed by the insatiable appetite to punish individuals for alleged moral crimes.

The upcoming tabling for consideration for parliamentary debate of Abdul Hadi Awang’s proposed amendments to the Shariah Courts (Criminal Jurisdiction) Act 1965 (Act 355) is a clear example of this preoccupation and thirst for punishment and punitive action.

Instead of being outraged, alarmed and speaking out against these threats to fundamental rights and freedoms, many Muslims in this country are altogether too willing to simply be quiet and keep their heads down low hoping and believing that these developments will never affect them; that they have nothing to fear in capitulation and submission.

Our recent history, the cases of Nik Raina and Dr. Kassim Ahmad, and the bitter experiences from other countries have shown that this is far from the truth.

We have all heard “kalau tak buat salah, kenapa nak takut?” from the mouths of law enforcement officials, politicians, persons in authority and religious figures.

This statement encourages people to do the following:

To have complete trust in the power of the State that they will never face wrongful suspicion, abuse of powers or unjust prosecution. That only the guilty will have cause to worry.

To be given the false sense of security and reassurance that nothing to hide means you have also have nothing to fear.

To only care about yourself and your own, and not look around and be aware of how others have been treated or targeted.

To live under the threat that just maybe, if you haven’t behaved properly, you actually do have something to fear.

Those who say and believe such statements are foolish. They don't have a basic appreciation of their rights and freedoms, and so they are willing to trade away ours and everybody else’s. Their understanding of the relationship between the government and those who are governed is not one of trust and responsibility but one of subservience based on fear and intimidation.

And yesterday, in my post If syariah punishment is so benign why increase the flogging? didn't I bring to you readers the words of Prof. Dr. Shad Saleem Faruqi, who was (is?) Professor of Law and Legal Adviser to Universiti Teknologi MARA, contained in his article titled 'The Enforcement of Morality' for the Malaysian Bar, as follows (further extract of yesterday's extracts):

But for reasons of human rights as well as for practical and economic considerations a line has to be drawn at which state intervention should cease and privacy is respected. Some criterion needs to be devised to justify state intervention in some situations and non-intervention in others.

Islam’s requirement to prohibit all that is munkar and to promote all that is ma’aruf has to be borne in mind. At the same time Islam’s respect for privacy must be honoured. 

Harming fellow Muslims, trying to uncover their nakedness, committing espionage or reporting on the private affairs of others is forbidden in Islam. 

According to a Hadith, exposing the faults of others through suspicion and espionage, spying upon one another, trying to bare each others hidden failings and exposing or exploring the privacy and personal weaknesses of the people is regarded as reprehensible. According to another Hadith “if anyone tries to uncover the nakedness of his Muslim brother, God will uncover his own nakedness.

And I commented: Haven't the above been precisely what the religious departments of the various states and federation of Malaysia been doing, spying on their own Muslim community to reporting on their private affairs and/or to explore the privacy and personal weaknesses of the people?

In fact I dare say these seem to be those religious organizations' principal role.

Thanks to JAIS, Selangorean Muslims will now face a state-wide tele-electronic Kempetai.

But as JAIS has nothing of value to add to progress in Malaysia, the organization should be disbanded. 

Ampun Tuanku, I appeal to HRH to get rid of intrusive JAIS, whose latest policy and application are ugly, invasive and totally reprehensible to Islam, menjunjung kasih, Tuanku.