Be fair and professional, cops told

PKR's K Vasantha Kumar claims police are only focusing on suspects from the opposition camp in their investigations into his political aide's murder.

PETALING JAYA: The police are only focusing on suspects from the Pakatan Rakyat camp in their investigations into the murder of political aide K Murugan during the 13th general election.

Tapah parliamentary seat candidate, K Vasantha Kumar today disclosed that the police had detained his other political aide S Marimuthu since June 7 as the latter was the last person to call Murugan before his death.

Vasantha Kumar also said that another three of his political helpers – S Poobalan, S Kumaravel and R Vijayan – had also been called up to give their statements to the police.

“Marimuthu is still in remand after four days. We just met the investigating office but we never got the latest update,” Vasantha told FMT this afternoon.

He said they will hold a protest outside IPD Batu Gajah where Marimuthu is being held at 7pm tonight.

The protest, he added, will be led by Batu Gajah MP V Sivakumar.

“Malaysians for Beng Hock coordinator Eng Yap Hwa said that it was “not right” for the police to only focus on “Pakatan supporters, but none from BN”.

“All those who had been arrested and called to give their statement are Pakatan supporters. No one from BN (were called in). I think it is not right.

“We suspect this is a politically motivated murder so the police should in fact investigate all possible angles including involvement by both BN and Pakatan,” he added.

Khalid should head probe

Eng then reiterated the call for Inspector-General of Police Khalid Abu Bakar to head the police probe into Murugan’s murder and form a special task force to investigate all political parties involved in the election campaign without fear and favour.

“We demand the police to conduct fair and professional investigation into Murugan’s murder.”

Last night, about 20 people including the victim’s family conducted a candlelight vigil outside Bukit Aman in protest of Khalid’s silence.

Eng said another candlelight vigil will be held on Wednesday, June 12 in a bid to urge the IGP to respond immediately.

Last week, a group of 20 NGOs led by Vasantha Kumar handed over a memorandum addressed to Khalid, urging the police chief to immediately investigate Murugan’s death.

Vasantha Kumar had lodged six police reports throughout the campaign period on threats received by his assistants.

On April 28, a group of PKR campaigners were assaulted by B Kalaivanar, who heads a BN-friendly NGO.

Vasantha Kumar lost the Tapah parliamentary seat to MIC’s M Saravanan by 7,927 votes.