The Chief Justice identified the main problem as being that of the backlog of cases in the High Court. He highlighted a 52.8% reduction in pending civil cases in the High Courts between 31 December 2008 and the present; a 25.6% reduction over the same period for criminal cases. He said that this reduction had been achieved through a combination of 15 measures: stocktaking and rearranging of files; increasing the number of judges; a tracking system/case management; e-court, namely case management system (CMS), queue management system (QMS) and court recording and transcribing system (CRT); appointment of managing judges; strict granting of postponements; spot checks/surprise visits to courts; mediation; judicial training and seminars/workshops; better utilisation of judicial time; close monitoring from the top management; establishment of specialised courts; regular meetings with, and support of, the Bar and the Attorney General; electronic filing and disposal of cases; and amendments to relevant legislation.

Among other things, the Chief Justice proudly displayed his circular on “Last Minute Postponements” for all to see. He stated that it was unfair to have the blame for postponement imposed solely on the courts. In order to transform this inaccurate perception, he urged judges and judicial officers to be strict in granting last-minute postponements without reasonable notice. Granting postponements was a judicial discretion, and he advised them to exercise that judicial discretion wisely. As for close monitoring by top management, he spoke of receiving daily reports, of setting key performance indicators, and of publishing figures on the disposal of cases amongst judges and judicial officers. He also spoke about administrative improvements that had been made, especially with regard to extracting and executing orders, hearing of joint petitions for divorces and the quick attending to complaints.

Despite repeated dialogues with the CJ and the senior judiciary, there are still cases where postponements are denied even when there are good reasons. Indeed a directive from the CJ to judges and judicial officers to grant adjournments in view of the recently-held 15th Malaysian Law Conference was totally ignored by one judge and the lawyer in that case, who was moderating one of the sessions, had to complete his hearing before attending. Lawyers also face the fixing of hearing dates that do not correspond with their available dates, despite these being made known in advance to the judge. The CJ has been somewhat unsympathetic in these instances, saying that lawyers will just have to find another lawyer to attend. He has stated in the past his view that lawyers spread themselves too thinly and take up more cases than they can practically manage. These multiple cases then end up being fixed for hearing on the same days, hence the need for adjournments. Apparently having another case fixed for hearing in another court is not an acceptable reason for applying for an adjournment, and judges and judicial officers have been taken to task for exercising their discretion for this reason. His solution: sole proprietorships and small law firms should merge, so that a firm would have more lawyers at its disposal to attend to the various cases. With Malaysian legal fees being comparatively very low, the issue of lawyers needing to earn a decent wage is conveniently ignored.

The recently-approved amendments to the Subordinate Courts Act 1964, which the CJ also mentioned in his briefing, will see cases with a monetary value of RM1 million or less being transferred to the subordinate courts. This is a pre-emptive move not to clog the superior courts with relatively minor cases in the future, and reduce the chances of a backlog building up once again. The problem is that the threshold of RM1 million is fairly high, and will include a considerable number of complex cases. Allowing officers of the Judicial and Legal Service, to which Sessions Court judges and magistrates belong, to decide these cases rather than High Court judges may impose an undue burden on the former. They will now also have the power and responsibility of deciding on interim issues connected with such cases, for example on injunctions. There is some concern amongst members of the legal profession that non-High Court judges would not have sufficient experience and expertise to decide on such matters. So while on the one hand access to the courts may be improved, the question of access to a just outcome remains wide open.

This is also true of the case of night courts. While this has been available for some time, the uptake has not been good. The initial driving idea behind these was that parties could opt to have their cases heard after hours, thus reducing the burden on litigants to make their days available. However we seem to have misunderstood the rationale for night courts. Night courts are more suited to the hearing of preliminary issues in a criminal matter especially those which arise immediately upon arrest, such as remand hearings and bail applications. This is especially true of those arrested after regular court hours, the intent being that accused persons are brought before a magistrate soon after they are arrested and their cases dealt with quickly. The Government Transformation Programme (GTP) has now stated that the night courts will be used to address the problem of street crime. That will be good. Yet the predisposition of our police force is to have alleged offenders kept in detention for as long as legally permissible, “pending investigations”. Night courts would only serve to frustrate such predispositions and hinder the way in which police investigations are carried out in this country. Further, night courts would work best when there is a public defender system or legal aid available at all night courts, to protect the rights of accused persons.

The latest pro-efficiency scheme by the GTP is to attempt to reduce street crime by marking street crime cases with a “J” prefix and fast-tracking them through the court process; speedy justice for snatch thieves and “Mat Rempit” and their ilk. But will this be achieved at the cost of compromising the civil liberties of an accused person? And what message does this approach send to the public at large, that some crimes are more deserving of a quick hearing than others? Will it be right to delay trials for some in order to expedite trials for others?

While the government’s aim of reducing street crime is laudable, the use of the courts to achieve the government’s policy goal of reducing crime and thus looking successful on law and order issues in time for the next election risks blurring the constitutionally separate roles of the judiciary and the executive.

In conclusion, no one is against efficiencies in the system of administration of justice. To do so would be like taking exception to motherhood and apple pie (or its suitable Malaysian equivalent). But when the courts are turned into an extension of the executive and become like any other government department forced to adhere to the drive towards achieving pre-determined performance targets, then there is great risk that justice and fairness are being compromised.

(Andrew Khoo is a lawyer in private practice. The views expressed are entirely his own. A version of this article, under the title “Delivering justice speedily”, first appeared in The Sun on 18 August 2010.)

In a crowded hotel function room in Kuala Lumpur on Tuesday Jun 8, a Palestinian refugee addressed a forum on the situation of refugees from non-South East Asian countries currently living in Malaysia and decried the lack of any form of humanitarian support and assistance for people like himself and his fellow Palestinian refugees in Malaysia.

Because the Malaysian Government has so far refused to sign the 1951 Convention on the Status of Refugees and its 1967 Protocol, people like him cannot even be officially recognised as refugees.

They have no legal status in Malaysia. They have no identification papers. They cannot work. They have to scrape together whatever they can in order to feed and clothe themselves and their families.

They live in constant fear of harassment by the police, of arrest and detention by immigration authorities and Rela personnel, and separation from their families, friends and informal support structures.

In the Dewan Rakyat in Kuala Lumpur on Monday Jun 7, the prime minister tabled a 15-point motion as part of the condemnation of Israel. Under point No. 4 he said Malaysia would “cooperate with member countries of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC), Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), Arab League and like-minded nations to uphold the principles of international law, including human rights laws, international humanitarian laws and the United Nations Charter, in handling the humanitarian crisis in Gaza”.

We have a humanitarian crisis at our doorsteps. As at the end of April 2010 the United Nations High Commission for Refugees had registered 87,700 refugees and asylum-seekers in Malaysia. 81,200 are from Burma, while 6,500 are from Sri Lanka, Somalia, Iraq, Afghanistan and other parts of the world including Palestine.

Our refusal to recognise their refugee status, to provide them with humanitarian assistance to feed and clothe them, to give them a chance to work and to educate their children, all these are breaches of principles of international law, including human rights laws, international humanitarian laws and the United Nations Charter.

Charity does not start at home

During the cruel and inhumane attack by the Israelis on the Gaza-bound humanitarian aid flotilla, 9 men of Turkish nationality were killed. Their deaths are indeed a tragedy. On Wednesday 9 June 2010, the wife of the prime minister of Malaysia handed over financial contributions to the Turkish Ambassador to be passed on to the families of those who had died. Each family received US$5,000 (RM16,400).

In 2009 at least 14 foreign nationals incarcerated in our various immigration detention centres died. Their families have not received a single sen from the Malaysian Government, let alone any word of commiseration or messages of condolence.

Under point No. 5 of the motion, the prime minister called “on like-minded countries to bring a resolution to the United Nations Security Council to refer the Zionist regime’s attack (on the aid ship) to the International Criminal Court (ICC)”. Under point No. 7 of the motion, the prime minister proposed “that Turkey consider action most under the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC)”.

Malaysia is neither a signatory to the Rome Statute nor a member of the International Criminal Court. While Malaysia signed the Final Act which created the International Criminal Court in 1998, she has steadfastly refrained from becoming a member, preferring instead to observe the development and workings of the International Criminal Court from the sidelines, and to adopt a “wait and see” approach.

And finally, starting from around 2006, the Malaysian Government has called upon the government of the United States of America, an ardent supporter of Israel, to shut down Guantanamo Bay because of the breaches of human rights and mistreatment of detainees perpetrated there and the fact that the continued detention of individuals was a breach of international laws and human rights laws.

Malaysia still maintains a maximum security detention centre in Kamunting to incarcerate people detained under the Internal Security Act.

The Act has been in place since 1960. There are currently 15 people under detention, from Bangladesh, Pakistan, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Malaysia, for offences ranging from alleged membership of Jemaah Islamiah, to forging of documents and human trafficking. We have laws dealing with membership of proscribed organisations, with forging of documents, and with human trafficking.

However none of these detainees has been charged in a court of law or found guilty of any offence. Their continued detention and denial of due process is a breach of international laws and human rights laws.

Malaysia is not being asked not to speak up or to speak out at an international level. She has every right to do so, and also every responsibility to do so, as a member of the international community. After all, she is a member of the United Nations Human Rights Council.

As a member she is mandated to uphold, protect and defend human rights and to speak out against breaches of human rights wherever they occur. All that is being asked is that she adopts the same resolute, determined and pro-active approach in Malaysia as she is pursuing overseas.

Malaysia must speak with one voice, both at home as well as abroad.

ANDREW KHOO is chair of the Human Rights Committee of Bar Council Malaysia, but writes here in his personal capacity. This article is published in Malaysiakini and is reproduced here with permission.

Lord we long for you to move in power.
There’s a hunger deep within our hearts
To see healing in our nation
Send your Spirit to revive us:

Heal our nation!
Heal our nation!
Heal our nation!
Pour out your Spirit on this land!

Lord we hear your Spirit coming closer,
A mighty wave to break upon our land,
Bringing justice, and forgiveness,
God we cry to you ‘revive us’:

The chorus kept echoing in my mind as people lined up to come forward to the chancel steps to receive communion (I attend an Anglican church). And my thoughts turned to the events taking place in our country. Later that evening I attended a book launch of Tenaganita’s “Revolving Doors”, a collection of the stories of 8 Myanmar refugees at the hands of the Malaysian authorities. Even as I sat down to read one of the stories, my stomach sickened at the injustice and cruelty inflicted by one human being onto another. My sense of being appalled was all the greater knowing that these representatives of authority wear the uniform of our country and perpetrate this evil purportedly in our collective name. The book launch was all the more interesting because the original printer of the book, after delivering all the books, had taken all the copies back and destroyed them once he read through the book’s contents, afraid that the authorities would revoke his printing licence issued under the Printing Presses and Publications Act 1984. 11th hour appeals were to no avail, so Tenaganita had to find another printer who miraculously got enough copies printed in 24 hours in time for the launch. Such is the power and evil that fear generates.

After the book launch some of us went to the 2 anti-Internal Security Act 1960 (ISA) rallies in town. The one at Central Market had more or less ended by the time we got there, and my heart was disappointed to hear that the police had somehow broken it up (although from the YouTube pictures I saw later on the group actually did very well, managing to walk around Central Market and were at least allowed 10 minutes near Dataran Merdeka). After that we moved on to Dataran Merdeka, where there was a significant police presence. We walked around and eventually chanced upon some people heading for the Hindu temple opposite Puduraya. And so we followed. Call it safety in numbers, but there was something refreshing about being in the midst of several hundred (the reports said 2 thousand) people all supporting the abolition of the ISA.

It may be simplistic, but to me one of the ways that God can heal our nation is for us to work to oppose and abolish the existence of the ISA. We need to stand up and be counted to say that we are against the ISA. That the ISA represents such a departure from even the minimum standards of decency to our fellow human beings and citizens which any self-respecting society should aspire.

But it is for so many more reasons that we should be against the ISA. At the last count, 66 of them. Some are husbands and fathers and brothers, all of them sons. Separated from their families, loved ones and friends, their lives torn apart, unable to test the veracity of and respond to the very serious allegations made against them which have deprived them of their liberty because they have been unconscionably denied their fundamental right to a fair and open trial. They have been incarcerated indefinitely with no knowledge, let alone certainty, of release. The longest-held detainee is now in his 6th year and 9th month of detention, and will remain locked away until at least January 2010.

What other reason? Because the use of the ISA in this recent manner, and under these circumstances, is clearly no longer simply about whether or not the ISA is an immoral piece of legislation (which it is). Instead it is about the attempt by the executive branch of government to justify the ill-thought through use of the ISA for purely self-serving (and self-surviving) partisan political reasons. And if doubt can be (and it certainly has been) cast about the true nature of the motives on the part of the executive in using the ISA this time, then it seriously calls into question the true nature of the motives on the part of the same executive in using the ISA all those times before.

Yet another reason? At this juncture of our history and our country’s political development, separate segments of society have been brought together and united in opposition to a cruel and inhumane piece of legislation. Leaders from all sides of the political divide, leaders representing the major religions in this country, leaders of civil society organisations, and the average person in the street, have all voiced their disapproval of the ISA. Its patent unfairness and injustice have been so vividly brought home into the living rooms of millions of households up and down our country. In a way that has never occurred before, ordinary people have sensed for themselves the evil violation of their civic rights and have responded to their civil responsibilities. Their righteous indignation has rightfully drawn them out into the streets, in silent candlelit protest against the abusive nature of the powers that be. The sound of their silence has been deafening. That the authorities feel threatened could be sensed in the order of a police officer to those attending the Bukit Aman vigil 2 weeks ago not only to disperse but to snuff out their candles. For the light of their candles shines brightly to expose the dark moral bankruptcy of those who would cling to and protect and defend a decadent remnant of colonial rule in order to continue to subjugate a people struggling for meaningful freedom. But our protests will not be snuffed out. It reminded me of John 3:19-21:

“Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what he has done has been done through God.” (NIV)

Even though we may not agree with the politics of some or even all of the detainees, yet in arresting one the executive arrests us all. The detention of one diminishes us all. As the poet John Donne once wrote:

“No man is an Island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the Continent, a part of the main; if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friends or of thine own were; any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankind; And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.

So we can and should do more. In order to show support and solidarity with those whose liberty has been snatched away, often in the darkness of the night. To speak out for those whose voices have been silenced. To stand up for those who are unable to do so for themselves. In the words of Friedrich Gustav Martin Niemoller, who survived the Second World War in Germany not withstanding his incarceration by the Nazi authorities:

“In Germany they came first for the Communists, and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a trade unionist. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn’t speak up because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time no one was left to speak up.”

May we always strive and never cease to rise above ourselves, in spite of ourselves, to realise that which is in our collective ability to achieve and accomplish in the name and by the power of God. And in God’s name bring healing to our nation.

No, they both cried when talking about their country. Our country. Malaysia. And what is happening to it. The man in his eighties bemoaned the fact that inter-religious civility between peoples of different faiths was fast disappearing. That Christians did not seem interested any longer in participating in inter-religious activities, working with people of other faiths in promoting inter-religious harmony, and praying for them in such settings. The man in his fifties “choked” when he was sharing about his work in the political arena, and cried as he spoke of both his hopes and concerns for the future of this country in the light of recent events.

I too have to confess that events of the last few weeks have occasionally caused me to throw up my hands in despair. It is as though we as a nation are intent on not wanting to celebrate 51 years (45 for our friends in Sabah and Sarawak) of independence, and instead wanting to stamp our independence of and from each other.

Prophets in the Old Testament also did a lot of crying, and also about their nation. But there were also prophets who didn’t cry but who had the courage of their calling and conviction to stand up to the king/ruler of the day and tell him he was wrong. My favourite is Nathan, prophet at the time of David. He, Nathan, is known to many of us today as the person who first coined that very trendy phrase, “You the man!” Only for Nathan the expression “You the man!” was not accompanied by “high fives” all around, or whoops of joy and delight. Or by people jumping and banging their stomachs together in a high bounce. No. If we read the story of David and Nathan in 2 Samuel 12 (and especially verse 7), we will know that “You the man!” was the climax of an accusation of lack of integrity against David. David had allowed his personal (and in this case sexual) interest to influence and interfere with his administrative judgment. He had arranged one of his military officers to be killed in battle so that he could take his wife to be his own.

David was not the first ruler to be guided by his “other head” in decision-making, and will neither be the last. Nor was he the first person to be guided entirely by personal self-interest in making a “governmental” decision, and again neither will he be the last. But what is important is that we must be prepared to hold our leaders to account for their misdeeds, whatever the personal cost to ourselves.

Nathan could well have been punished for his forthrightness. The risk was very real. In another time and in another place the prophet Nehemiah approached Artaxerxes (Nehemiah 2) for a request on behalf of the exiled Israelites that they be allowed to return home. We read that Nehemiah had felt it necessary to wait 4 months to find possibly the right moment to approach the king. Nehemiah writes of his fear (Nehemiah 2:2). There was great anxiety on his part, which was reflected in a less than cheerful disposition when serving the king (Nehemiah 2:3). But God honoured Nehemiah’s integrity of service to a (non-Christian) king, thorough which Nehemiah had found favour with Artaxerxes, and the king granted Nehemiah’s wishes. Whether Nehemiah subsequently advised his followers to, “Don’t worry, be happy” (which Bobby McFerrin turned into a reggae-style hit song some years ago) was not recorded and is therefore now lost to posterity.

Today in Malaysia Christians around the country are being called upon to stand up for the truth. It may mean writing articles to tell the true story. It may mean speaking up for the truth. And we do it in the face of all manner of oppressive laws, and in the face of the self-interest of one or more persons, or collections of people. It is not easy. But we must find through our on-going relationship with God, brought about by the sacrifice of Jesus Christ and emboldened and empowered by the Holy Spirit, the strength and courage and commitment to do so.

And even as our attention is drawn to two electoral events this week, one in Permatang Pauh (on 26 August 2008) and another in Denver, Colorado, United States of America (the Democratic National Convention from 25-28 August 2008), I leave you with this quotation from Robert Kennedy. Some of you will recall that Robert Francis Kennedy, Senator from New York and one-time Attorney-General of the United States in his brother John Fitzgerald Kennedy’s administration, was about to be made the nominee of the Democratic Party for the presidential election at its National Convention to be held in Chicago in 1968 (yes, 40 years ago) when he was assassinated on 5 June 1968 by Sirhan Sirhan.

I remember as a university undergraduate visiting the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library at Columbia Point, Boston during my summer vacation from London. The Library has a section devoted to Robert Kennedy. And in one of the displays was an excerpt from a speech given by him which read as follows:

“There are those who look at things the way they are, and ask why… I dream of things that never were, and ask why not?”

I subsequently found out that this was actually taken from George Bernard Shaw (an Irish playright who wrote, amongst other things, the play “Pygmalion” which was subsequently made into the movie “My Fair Lady”), who wrote:

”Some men see things as they are and say ‘Why?’ I dream things that never were and say, ‘Why not?’”

And from Joel 2:28-32 (NIV):

“And afterward, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your old men will dream dreams, your young men will see visions.

Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my Spirit in those days. I will show wonders in the heavens and on the earth, blood and fire and billows of smoke.

The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord.

And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved; for on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem there will be deliverance, as the Lord has said, among the survivors whom the Lord calls.”

May God bless Malaysia and all her inhabitants, citizens and non-citizens alike. Selamat Hari Merdeka.

I have a healthy scepticism towards signs and wonders. As a “banana” (yellow – Chinese/Asian on the outside, white – western-educated on the inside), I am sufficiently aware of the dichotomy of living with one foot in either “world”. As a Chinese Malaysian/Asian, I am not alien to the culture of spirits. Chinese/Asian folklore is replete with stories of ghosts and spirits, of mediums and trances. The colloquial language of Asia also has many idiomatic expressions which encapsulate this form of spiritual experience. As a predominantly western-educated and western-outlooked individual, I am also in touch with the secular humanist train of thought which has more or less excluded or discounted the world of the supernatural. (Note: “supernatural” comes from the Latin “supra natura”, which literally means “above nature”.)

So when I first found one-sen coins on the road, I thought nothing of it. I mean, we find all sorts of things on the road, least of all one-sen coins. Most people would say, and I too would agree, that this is pure coincidence.

I can’t pinpoint when God began to use this as a means of assuring me of His presence in my life. It’s just that I would be walking along the road (and I do a fair bit of walking as I choose not to drive) and having a quiet conversation with God about things that are happening. In the days before hands-free handsets people would think I was mad, talking to myself. Now people just assume I am talking on the mobile telephone via a hands-free device. Anyway I would be thinking and talking and wondering whether I was just talking out loud to myself or talking to God when I would stumble upon a one-sen coin. Initially I made no connection. Then gradually each time I talked to God, or each time I struggled with some issue whilst walking to or from work or to or from an appointment, I would invariably find a one-sen coin. I began to associate it with God reminding me that He was there, listening.

Some of you will now think that I have totally lost the plot. And I would not fault you. It is very easy to “spiritualise” an otherwise not uncommon experience. Ask a mathematician and he would probably tell you that the chances of finding a one-sen coin on a Malaysian road or footpath is not necessarily low. So why should it be given this other-worldly association.

I would have left it at that save for one incident a few months back. I was doing my usual walking and thinking and talking to God (or just out loud, depending on your viewpoint) and looking at the ground when I once again came across a one-sen coin. A Malaysian one-sen coin. Nothing bizarre or odd, you might say. No, except that this was on the side of a road in Yangon, the capital of Myanmar. Yes, yes, I can rationalise how it got there, courtesy of the many Myanmar nationals working in Malaysia, returning home and dropping Malaysian coin currency generously on the road-side. But just at that particular point in time, when I was talking to God, in a foreign country?

Simply because something can be logically explained is no reason to deprive an experience of its possible deeper significance. Take giving birth, for example. OK, I know it is not something that I have personally experienced. We all know how babies happen, how they come to be. But that does not make the miracle of birth any less wonderful. Trust me, I have 3 urban urchins to prove it.

I look ahead with some regret that we appear to be slowly phasing out the use of one-sen coins. Will this mean that God will no longer assure me of His presence in my life? Hardly, I think. Perhaps He will now just have to use higher denominations!

Postscript: I wrote this article on 13 August 2008. On 14 August 2008 I flew out to Chiangmai from the LCCT. While waiting to board the plane I mentally went through the article again, reflecting further on it. Then I made my way from the boarding gate to the plane. As I was walking, I came across a 20 sen coin along the walkway to the plane. God definitely was listening, and He clearly has a sense of humour.

I was also pleased that the PM said that “[w]e do not impose constraints on people of different faiths discussing these issues although they are sensitive in nature. Only through discussions can we understand and try solve the issues.” He went on to add that Malaysians were able, as the Bernama report states, “to “sit down and discuss” various issues, especially on religion, without having the fear of repercussions from any other party.” He added, “We are a nation of many faiths. This is what Malaysia is and will always be. We have to a certain extent reached a high degree of tolerance” and “If not for this tolerance we would have disintegrated as a nation a very long time ago. The last 50 years is not 50 years of failure but 50 years of success.”

I deeply appreciated what the PM said because it is in absolute stark contrast and directly opposite to what the Minister of Home Affairs has been saying of late, especially about the forum on Article 121(1A) of the Federal Constitution being organised by the Bar Council on Saturday 9 August 2008. The Minister of Home Affairs, if the press and media reports are to be believed, has basically termed any open and public discussion of religion and conversion as being “uncivilised”. It would appear that people like the Minister of Home Affairs would rather that topics like religion forever remain sensitive so that it can be a continuing excuse not to discuss this in the open. He would rather that any problems be worked out in the darkness, in the smoky back rooms where political compromises are hatched out, free from the bright and energising sunlight of transparency and accountability that I thought the PM stood for. If the Minister of Home Affairs had his way, he would use the continued sensitivity of these issues as a permanent excuse not to discuss them in public, whilst knowing in a self-serving way that so long as we do not discuss these issues in public, they will remain sensitive. If he appears so at odds with his own Prime Minister, he should do the honourable thing and resign.

And yet even as I listened to the PM’s speech, an air of disbelief overcame me. He said that, “Ours is a good mix, no one race can oppress another race and no one race can form the government and govern this country…this is my belief.” If the PM sincerely believes this, as I have no doubt he does, why was the former Selangor Mentri Besar allowed privately to meet with representatives of PAS immediately after the 8 March 2008 general elections in an attempt to form an UMNO-PAS all Malay-Muslim government in Selangor? At the expense of a multi-racial, multi-religious and multi-ethnic Malaysia?

I was also perplexed when the PM said that he was “comfortable” attending the dinner and having a vegetarian meal and listening to the issues raised by the MCCBCHST. Prime Minister, I don’t want you to feel comfortable. When people are comfortable, they do nothing, so as to prolong that feeling of comfort. How can you or anyone in government, be it executive, legislative or judiciary, feel comfortable when people like Subashini and Shamala and Revathi are suffering because religious issues and the laws of our nation have torn their families apart, and the courts of our country have been emasculated and made powerless to help solve their problems?

Prime Minister, you yourself in your speech last night raised the fact that people are questioning your ability to deliver on the promises that you have made. You said you wanted to be the PM of all Malaysians. It is high time you proved it with positive action, not with any more words. I, we the citizens of this country, want to have faith in you. Help us to overcome our disbelief. This is the truth that you need to hear. As you yourself said last night, “Only after the truth is known can a problem be solved. So the truth, however painful must be told. And in overcoming problems, justice is important.” “People have placed their trust in me and I must fulfill their expectations.”

The time for you to fulfill our expectations has arrived. It is now.

Andrew Khoo Chin Hock
Co-Deputy Chairperson
Human Rights Committee
Malaysian Bar Council

Here’s a report on the Prime Minister’s speech at the dinner at the website of the Malaysian Bar Council.

http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2008/6/11/nation/21518642&sec=nation

I wrote a response to that story and sent it to The Star on 12 June 2008. I can only assume that they had decided not to publish it because it too embarrassingly highlights the very obvious flaws in our public transport system and how out of touch our cabinet ministers are when it comes to the issue of the use of public transport, given how cocooned and molly-coddled they are with their government cars, government-paid-for petrol and drivers. This is what I said:

Comment on Minister’s experience of public transport after 2 days

Datuk Shahrir Samad is both wrong and right (Nation, N8, 11 June 2008). There IS a bus that snakes its way through Bukit Tunku, where he lives. He would however have to walk some distance from his house to the bus stop. When he arrives at the bus stop, he will not know whether the bus has come or gone, or when the next bus will arrive, as there is no timetable. It is supposed to be every half an hour but sometimes it is only once an hour. This lack of certainty and the inability to plan his journey will eventually discourage him from using public transport. The same will occur when he arrives at the Putrajaya/Cyberjaya station. He’s fortunate to have a driver to pick him up. If he goes to the bus station at the lower ground level, he will see buses to Putrajaya and other destinations, but their departure times are all unknown. Passengers mill around in uncertainty waiting for tell-tale signs that the bus is about to depart. If he were to try to get a bus from his office in Putrajaya back to the station, he would face the same thing, standing in the hot sun or the rain at a bus stop in Putrajaya wondering when the next bus will arrive. When he finally arrives at KL Sentral, he will have to find his way down to the bus station on the lower ground level. There is only one narrow staircase down for everybody to use. The one narrow escalator in existence is used for people coming up. There is one small lift. Egress and ingress from the bus terminal is a traffic and safety consultant’s nightmare. The immediate area at the foot of the staircase and escalator is monopolised by the LCCT bus companies. Buses are parked by the kerbside and pedestrians shoot out and cross the inner service road between buses. Needless to say, the yellow pedestrian crossings are ignored, and buses and waiting taxis regularly park over it. When it rains, those waiting for public buses on the kerb of the outer service road will get wet.

I hope he will highlight to the Cabinet the need for a better-planned feeder system to link up to our trains, whether Putra, KTM, monorail or ERL. In terms of passenger information, the technology is already available through GPS to inform passengers when the next bus is arriving. It is in use in cities like London in England and Thessalonica in Greece, to name but 2. The financial markets are not the only places where people need up-to-date information and certainty. People need to plan ahead for their journeys, and their decision-making is dependent on up-to-date information. If they don’t have that information, they are likely to use their cars instead. In terms of feeder services, perhaps people who actually use buses should be invited to help plan the routes, instead of car-driving civil servants and town planners. There is also a serious need to plan for the safety of passengers in getting to and from bus stops and train stations. In addition to the situation at KL Sentral highlighted above, Datuk Shahrir will no doubt not be surprised to know that he cannot get a bus from KL Sentral to Parliament House. The nearest he can get on the bus is somewhere along busy Jalan Duta. There is no proper bus shelter at Jalan Duta. He will merely be let off by the side of the road. Then he will have to cross Jalan Duta, all 4 busy lanes of it, to get to the other side. There is no pedestrian crossing or overhead bridge. Once he gets to the other side of Jalan Duta he will have to try to make his way to Jalan Parliamen to get to the bridge entering Parliament House. There is no pedestrian pathway. He will have to risk life and limb again to cross Persiaran Mahameru.

In one shape or form, this is the daily experience of public transport users, especially those who combine the use of buses and trains. After 2 days, Datuk Shahrir is already saying it is not so convenient. And this is with the help of drivers on both ends of his journey! What if he had to rely on feeder buses instead of drivers? And what if he had to do this every working day? Perhaps both the Minister of Transport and the Federal Territories Minister should try using public transport for a month in order to understand first hand the frustrations faced by ordinary people going about their daily business using public transport in the Federal Capital (and no doubt elsewhere too). Please don’t fob us off by saying that there are already plans in place to make more investments in public transportation. We need solutions now to these long-existing problems. After all, pump petrol prices in Malaysia have been on the increase for some time. The government has been talking about improvements in public transport for quite some time. So why the delay in improvements to the overall public transport system? Enough talk, let’s see some immediate action.

Utility workers are also busy all over Yangon replacing electricity and telephone poles.

Electricity supply is still limited, and police have to do added duty directing traffic at traffic-lightless major junctions. Some apartment blocks have generators to power up, as have most of the hotels. But many houses in Yangon still have to make do with candles. Running water depends on electricity powered pumps. It has rained every day in the week I was in Yangon. The monsoon rains have come early this year, spearheaded by Cyclone Nargis. A second potential cyclone threatened for a while, but dissipated. But the rains continue, keeping the many potholes full and the roads muddy.

Terrestrial telephones are not fully operational, and e-mail connectivity, not the greatest even in the best of times, is still unavailable in many places.

There is also irony between the news heard over BBC and CNN shown in the hotel room and the New Light of Myanma, the local English-language tabloid. On the one hand, the daily paper is replete with endless pictures of generals handing over aid to affected areas, southwest of Yangon in the delta area, stressing the adequacy of relief efforts and supplies, albeit from overseas friends. The local national-language television station is no different. Grateful cyclone victims in relief centres or in front of tented housing are seen being greeted by generous generals, and there are happy handshakes as tokens of aid are presented. On the other hand, BBC and CNN consistently broadcast the failure of aid to reach those truly in need, the refusal to allow foreign aid workers to enter the country and the conservativeness of the estimates of death and homelessness.

The truth, as always, is somewhere in between. Quite exactly where no one really knows. Aid is arriving, even from the US, and is being distributed. Some victims are being relieved. But communications and transport links are such that not everyone is being reached. It can take up to 7 hours to travel the distance of 90 kms, the length of the journey between Yangon and some of the nearer towns in the affected delta region. From these towns, it can then be many hours by boat to extremely remote villages, tucked away in the maze of land and water that constitutes the Delta region. Reports have been received of whole villages having disappeared. One survivor told me that in his village of 600, only 3 survived. He only did so by clinging to a palm coconut tree for his life as wave after wave brought on by strong winds buffeted his village for hours. I saw photographs of survivors with their chests and inner thighs rubbed raw from the friction of clinging on to trees. Another friend said to me that of 70 people in a sub-village, only 19 survived. Many who died were related to him. So it is not surprising that the death toll is raised almost on a daily basis. It went from 251 to 20,000 before I arrived. It moved up to 38,000 by mid-week and by the end of the week it had almost doubled to 78,000, and still rising. All this in the first 14 days. ICRC estimates put the death toll at anything up to 128,000. The government has stated that 1 million people are homeless. The UN puts the figure at anywhere from 1.5 to 2.5 million.

Like the clearing of roads, meeting the needs of victims probably has its priorities. The important roads, from the airport to the city, near diplomatic compounds, public monuments and key temples and monasteries, and government offices, get attention first. So the bigger towns and those with easier access are reached first. The government has now allowed religious bodies to set up relief camps in addition to ones established by the government, an indication perhaps that the situation is graver than the government had originally anticipated. Aid convoys from international relief organisations and NGOs are slowly getting through, but foreign personnel are however still not welcomed.

If the tsunami in Aceh in December 2004 taught us anything, it is that concerted effort and multi-level co-operation is essential. Not just in the immediate aftermath, but for years following, as rehabilitation and resettlement gradually replace relief as the principal focus. This can only be achieved through a willingness to accept not just foreign aid but advice and assistance as well. National pride and professions of self-sufficiency must be put aside. Anything less than that would be a disservice to the memory of those who died and a denial of the future for those who survived. And those who survived deserve more than what they are getting at the moment.

If the government is truly committed to responding to the rising price of fuel, it should immediately consider conservation measures, both direct and indirect. I can think of 4:

1. All ministers, deputy ministers, senior civil servants and judges who currently drive government cars from Putrajaya to Kuala Lumpur or vice versa should henceforth use KL Transit. There is a decent enough bus system from any part of Putrajaya to the train terminal, and from there it is about 15 minutes to KL Sentral. Of course not enough people do it at the moment, which is why the U82 bus route, which is the only Rapid KL bus to pass anywhere near Parliament, doesn’t even have a proper covered bus stop anywhere along Jalan Duta for people to alight. And when one gets down, there is no safe route to walk to Parliament. Until and unless ministers and deputy ministers, senior civil servants and other policy makers literally walk the talk and actually use public transport, our entire urban planning perspective will be skewed towards car ownership and use. Because the people who do the planning are not pedestrians. And because if we actually promote the use of public transport, what will happen to our national car policy?
2. We need more feeder buses on the roads. It is not enough to simply have the LRT system. People need to speedily and efficiently get to the stations. If you have to wait between 30 minutes to one hour for a feeder bus, you will give up and drive instead. And if the feeder bus takes you to your nearest station which is actually in the opposite direction of where you are headed, you are definitely not going to use it.
3. Have more covered walkways linking major buildings to public transport hubs. If people are going to get wet, they are going to stay in their cars. There is no way to walk from KL Sentral to the MIDA building and remain dry when it is raining. Or from the U82 bus stop to Parliament. Or from Ampang Park to any building along Jalan Tun Razak. You try and see.
4. Enforce traffic laws, especially at pedestrian crossings. If people don’t feel safe walking our streets and crossing our roads, they won’t risk getting out of their cars to use public transport. When was the last time you saw a motorist get ticketed for stopping on a pedestrian crossing? Or a motorcyclist ticketed for riding on the pedestrian pavement? Or a car ticketed for parking on the pedestrian pavement?