Serving BN’s special interest at the expense of public safety

This article was earlier published in TheAntDaily.com on 4/12/2013

The Special Branch, or better known as the SB, is an intelligence unit of the Royal Malaysia Police. The SB is tasked with acquiring and developing intelligence on internal and external threats to our nation’s security and public order.

Apart from dealing with security intelligence, the SB’s other tasks are to gather reports related to political security on behalf of the Barisan Nasional government, like activities run by politicians, political parties and some selected NGOs; establishing profiles on political leaders from branch, division, state and national levels; monitoring leaders of NGOs and activists; monitoring political situation as well as gathering information on the people’s sentiment towards major issues, public policies and the current government.

The SB was established during the Malayan Emergency period to deal with the Communist Party of Malaya (CPM) guerilla warfare against the then Malayan colonial government. Until 1954, the SB only had about 460 personnel to combat the CPM insurgency. The SB was responsible for gathering intelligence and conducting surveillance on the CPM.

As at 2012, there were more than 8,200 police personnel attached to the SB nationwide. In the same year, the SB had also produced about 380,000 reports, the majority of which were files of surveillance against political parties, political leaders, human rights activists, NGO leaders, political dissidents and critics of the government.

That means SB officers had produced about 1,000 reports or more a day. Sounds funny, isn’t it? Is our nation’s security situation far worse than during the Emergency era? Has national security been undermined continuously until the police need to mobilise 8,200 personnel into the SB?

In stunning contrast, the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) only managed to resolve about 60,000 cases in 2012; this means only about 164 cases a day. And today, the crime spree has risen to its peak. Wouldn’t it be better for the SB’s efficiency to be utilised to combat the rising crime?

Deputy Home Minister Datuk Dr Wan Junaidi Tuanku Jaafar has recently told Parliament that the police force does not spy on politicians at all. That is indeed a blatant lie. Ask any police officer you know and they would certainly tell you about the inner workings of the SB. It is already an open secret.

If the BN government is so adamant in maintaining or increasing the strength of the SB for the purpose of keeping tabs on national security issues and threats, why did it fail to prevent the terrorist intrusion into Lahad Datu, Sabah in the first place?Then there was also a second intrusion recently at an island resort in Sabah’s east coast, which ended with one Taiwan tourist killed and his female companion abducted. Why are these SB personnel not around to prevent such attacks from occurring?

Do not say that these are not SB’s responsibilities and start passing the buck to the Royal Army Intelligence Corps (Koris), the Naval Intelligence or the Air Force Intelligence Unit. To all of us, the entire intelligence apparatus under this government had failed miserably.

The intelligence apparatus under this government has been deliberately used to spy on its own nation, its own people, the opposition parties, its leaders, human right activists, NGO leaders, and those who are critical of the BN government.

If the activities of 80 per cent of the police force are directed at combating crimes in our nation, then why are our people still living in fear? Why are these criminals still terrorising our people? And finally, why are these criminals getting increasingly daring in their activities?

If the SB personnel have indeed proven their efficiency in their intelligence-gathering work against the opposition politicians and political dissidents, why not use their efficiency to combat these criminals instead? Why not mobilise the SB to combat those hardcore criminals who are threatening public safety?

We all must admit that the SB played an effective role during the Malayan Emergency – infiltrating into the CPM ranks and crippling CPM operations on numerous occasions. Why can’t the SB do the real job that it is supposed to do today: protect our people and the nation from our enemies? Why did the police and the SB continue to allow themselves to be controlled and moulded by the ruling elites for their own political ends?

Looks like the SB’s principles and professionalism had gone down the drain for good.