What a novel way to get an endorsement — by getting your enemies to pronounce you innocent. But then you never know. The PAC might actually declare that Najib is a crook and hence Malaysians would be celebrating Christmas with new Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin and new Deputy Prime Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi.
THE CORRIDORS OF POWER
Raja Petra Kamarudin
Most people do not trust the Malaysian judiciary. No doubt this was not always the case but has been so over the last 30 years or so from 1987 since the time when Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad was the Prime Minister. Since then very few Malaysians would trust Malaysian judges and Malaysian courts.
This is evident in those foreign companies that do business in Malaysia. They insist that in the event of a dispute the case has to go for international arbitration and not argued in a Malaysian court. They would prefer the Singapore judiciary any time rather than the Malaysian judiciary.
That is how bad the image of the Malaysian judiciary is. No one wants to face a Malaysian judge. They would rather their case be heard overseas and not in Malaysia. And this has been the perception the last 30 years and has not improved since. In fact, it has gotten worse since the late 1990s.
If you were to ask Malaysians as to why they have a very low opinion of Malaysia’s judiciary, they will tell you that Malaysian judges can be told or instructed as to what to do and they would normally make rulings that favour the government.
And that is why one of the perjuangan of the opposition is to make sure that Malaysia has an independent judiciary — meaning it is not yet independent or is no longer independent.
This, of course, is a perception problem because I personally know a number of judges and I know them well enough to know that they are actually against the government. And some of these judges have actually put their career on the line by ruling against the government and in favour of the opposition.
I know one judge who by now would be the Chief Justice but has been bypassed so many times because he seemed to rule in favour of the opposition too many times.
Actually, these judges, some who went to school with me, did not rule in favour of the opposition or against the government. They just ruled in favour of justice and against injustice. It just so happened that the outcome favoured the opposition.
But these judges paid for this ‘mistake’ of ‘favouring’ the opposition even though they did not favour the opposition or make any mistake. Again, just as it is a perception issue that the Malaysian judiciary is not independent, it is also a perception issue that judges who rule in favour of the opposition are anti-government.
Could it be that the case against that particular opposition leader was weak in the first place? Could it be that the public prosecutor badly argued his or her case? Could it be that the accused had a better lawyer who argued his or her case well?
The essence in a trial is that if you allege a wrongdoing then you need to prove that allegation. In a criminal indictment, the accused need not prove innocence. The accuser needs to prove guilt. All the accused needs to do is to raise reasonable doubt. And if that is achieved then the benefit of the doubt must be given to the accused.
Of course, in certain cases circumstantial evidence can also play a part. And if you fail to produce an alibi then that can also work against you as well. So you can actually get convicted because you are not able to defend yourself against hard evidence and/or the testimony of a witness or witnesses.
Nevertheless, since Malaysia no longer has a jury system, then the judge or panel of judges would have to decide whose story of the two sounds more credible. Is the witness (or witnesses) reliable and of strong/noble character? Is the witness (or witnesses) consistent or has been caught lying a number of times — thus affecting his of her credibility?
Unless you were actually caught with a smoking gun in your hand and the deceased at your feet when two police officers appeared onto the scene (and testified to that affect), or unless you were caught with the money in your pocket (or in your drawer or bank account), then a lot may depend on he says, she says.
So it would be one word against the other and the judge or judges now need to consider which of the two is telling the truth and which is lying.
The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has already started its investigation into the affairs of 1MDB. The PAC actually comes under Parliament and has vast powers. It can summon anyone it wishes to appear before the Committee and if you refuse to do so the police can be sent to your door to drag you kicking and screaming before the Committee.
The way the PAC would ‘try’ the case is a bit different from the way a court would. The PAC is sort of like a Commission of Inquiry. Well, actually it is a commission of inquiry. It is just that it is not a Royal Commission of Inquiry but a Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry.
By and large the functions and purpose of the Committee are the same. Its job is to investigate whatever needs to be investigated. In this case it is investigating 1MDB. How far and how deep the investigation goes is entirely up to what it hopes to achieve.
Does it just want to know what happened to the RM42 billion and where the money went? Or does it want to know more than that? Actually, the PAC needs not confine its investigation to just what happened to the money. It can probe even deeper than that. How far and how deep does the PAC want to probe? I suppose we will know that in due time.
What is most interesting about the PAC is that this is not a government Committee but a Parliamentary Committee. There are 13 members of the Committee, eight from the government and five from the opposition. However, eight are opposed to Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak while it is not known what the stand of the other five is.
Whatever it may be we know that the majority of the members of the PAC are anti-Najib. And that was the gist of my article yesterday: Najib plays Russian roulette.
Is this going to be Najib’s Waterloo? Of course, when we talk about Waterloo we always mean the defeat of Napoleon. But then while Napoleon may have been defeated Wellington won. So is Najib going to come out of this like Napoleon or like Wellington?
Yes, a most interesting development indeed. Najib has put his neck on the chopping block by entrusting his fate and future to a Committee that is already eight versus five against him — and maybe even more for all we know. Logically, Najib should prepare himself to lose his head.
However, if the reverse happens, then Najib can confidently and proudly say that he has been cleared and has been given a clean bill of health not by the Malaysian judiciary, which no one trusts, but by those who wish for his downfall.
What a novel way to get an endorsement — by getting your enemies to pronounce you innocent. But then you never know. The PAC might actually declare that Najib is a crook and hence Malaysians would be celebrating Christmas with new Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin and new Deputy Prime Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi.
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