PETALING JAYA: A civil society group today urged the Cabinet to reject Muhyiddin Yassin’s explanations about the line-up of the task force to probe the disappearances of a pastor and an activist, which has come under scrutiny since it was announced last week.
“At its meeting this week, the Cabinet must reject Muhyiddin’s lame decisions and explanations,” the Citizen Action Group on Enforced Disappearance (CAGED) said in a statement today.
“The Cabinet can, of course, choose to be as deaf, aloof and lame as Muhyiddin and his Barisan Nasional predecessors in the face of abuse of power by the police.
“If it makes this choice, the Cabinet will confirm the public’s growing conviction that the Pakatan Harapan government is not serious about police reform.”
CAGED previously questioned the line-up of the task force established to investigate the disappearances of Pastor Raymond Koh and Perlis-based activist Amri Che Mat.
Koh has been missing since Feb 13, 2017 while Amri, the founder of NGO Perlis Hope, went missing on Nov 24, 2016.
In April, an inquiry by the Human Rights Commission of Malaysia (Suhakam) concluded that they were victims of enforced disappearance.
CAGED today reiterated its objection to three of the six task force members, including its chairman, saying they should have been rejected from the get-go.
It said one of the members, Mokhtar Mohd Noor, a former police legal division head who had made submissions on behalf of the police during the hearing, should be investigated.
“Muhyiddin’s attempt to defend the appointment of Mokhtar is lame, misleading and astonishing,” it said. “He claims Mokhtar is acceptable because ‘he was not involved in the hearing. He merely attended an open session’.
“Nothing could be further from the truth,” it said, adding that Mokhtar had been responsible for the entire police case in the inquiry.
It also challenged the claim that Mokhtar had only attended an open session.
“During the final oral submissions, he addressed the inquiry panel 32 times on behalf of the police. He even expressed disappointment with questions posed on the day of the final oral submissions.”
CAGED likewise continued questioning the appointment of Zamri Yahya, who was Bukit Aman’s Integrity and Standard Compliance Department director, and Abd Rahim Uda, the retired High Court judge who is leading the task force.
It also said that Muhyiddin’s announcement had omitted the terms of reference, which it added “is sufficient for the public to draw its own conclusions”.
“The profiles of the ‘task force’ members and the absence of respected, professional investigators with police powers to gather evidence from inside and outside PDRM make this clear: the ToR of the ‘task force’ is to undermine Suhakam’s work, not to investigate the erratic and slipshod police ‘investigation’ to date.” - FMT
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.