It is often said that woes arrive in waves and calamities tend to cluster. Few institutions exemplify that maxim more painfully this week than our police force, whose reputation has been derided, pulverised, and publicly pilloried - largely through its own doing.
If the initial incident raised eyebrows, the statements that followed from senior officers only deepened public suspicion.
Instead of clarifying matters, they cemented the perception that the “self-defence” narrative was little more than a convenient fiction - a flimsy justification for shooting three men in cold blood.
On Nov 24, Malacca police chief Dzulkhairi Mukhtar announced that three suspected criminals were shot dead after one allegedly slashed a police officer with a machete during an early morning confrontation at an oil palm plantation in Durian Tunggal, Alor Gajah.
But on Dec 3, the families of the deceased publicly rejected this account. They cited an audio recording allegedly captured during the incident itself - a recording made by M Jayashree, the wife of one of the victims, G Logeswaran, 29.
In that phone call, she said, the men could be heard cooperating with police as they were being detained. Nothing in the recording, she insisted, suggested aggression or threats.
A transcript of the recording provided by Lawyers for Liberty can be viewed here.
Three days later, Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim ordered Inspector-General of Police Khalid Ismail to conduct a “transparent” investigation into the shootings and to submit a detailed report to Home Minister Saifuddin Nasution Ismail.
The cabinet, Anwar said, had discussed the matter, and he stressed that no one should be protected.
I had reservations and noted: “But what does ‘transparent’ mean in practice? And more critically, how independent can an investigation be when the police are tasked with probing their own officers, only to submit the findings to the minister who oversees them?
Bukit Aman’s Criminal Investigations Department (CID) subsequently took over, with its director, M Kumar, announcing a special team to review all reports, including those lodged by the victims’ families. He pledged an investigation that would be “transparent, fair, and professional”.
For a moment, the public exhaled.
Clumsy bid to discredit
Just as confidence seemed to stabilise, Dzulkhairi delivered a baffling twist. Last week, he claimed that Jayashree - the woman whose recording had cast doubt on the police narrative - had 10 prior criminal records, including for armed robbery and attempted murder.
He added that her father had a criminal past and was wanted for robbery. He further asserted that Jayashree was not legally married to Logeswaran, who supposedly had another wife in Johor.
Armed robbery? Attempted murder? If these allegations were true, why was she freely walking around instead of being charged and being in remand awaiting trial?
Lawyer Rajesh Nagarajan, representing the families, dismissed the claims as “completely false and illogical”.
Which raises the obvious question: Why were such allegations aired publicly at all, especially when a special investigation team was already in place?
If the intention was to discredit a potential witness, it has backfired spectacularly. Instead of undermining her credibility, the attempt has only cast further doubt on the police’s own integrity.
The egg, unmistakably, has splattered on Dzulkhairi’s face - and by extension, on the institution he represents.
Public trust hangs in the balance
The tragedy in Malacca is no longer just about whether three men were wrongfully killed. It is now a test of whether the police force can still command public trust - or whether it will continue to erode its own credibility through careless statements, contradictory narratives, and character assassinations masquerading as clarification.
If the police wish to restore confidence, the path is simple but difficult: stop the theatrics, stop the deflections, and let the facts speak without interference.
Anything less will only reinforce what many Malaysians already fear - that when the police investigate the police, justice becomes optional.
Until the truth is laid bare, the public will continue to ask the question the authorities seem most reluctant to confront: Who are the police protecting - the public, or themselves? - Mkini
R NADESWARAN is a veteran journalist who tries to live up to the ethos of civil rights leader John Lewis: “When you see something that is not right, not fair, not just, you have to speak up. You have to say something; you have to do something.” Comments: citizen.nades22@gmail.com.
The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of MMKtT.
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