Who ordered the ‘disappearance’ of Pastor Koh?

“The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he did not exist.”

- Verbal Kint, ‘The Usual Suspects’

First off, bravo Nathaniel Tan for clearly articulating issues on the minds of many.  Nathaniel’s piece – ‘The importance of due process and dignified governance’ - is an important reminder that the opposition is governing the country now, and should not be in the business of radicalising their base.

When Finance Minister Lim Guan Eng babbles on how he would carry on his “truthful” approach regardless of how it affects the ebb and flow of the market, it is exactly the kind of arrogance that is not needed in this new government. No politician speaks the “truth”. An honest politician is factual (an extremely rare breed), and a good leader does not have to embellish facts while inspiring confidence.

The marketplace is inspired when the government is factual about how they are going to solve the problem and not when the government uses any opportunity to confirm how bad the situation is because of the former regime. Guan Eng is not speaking to his base. Now he is speaking to anyone who has a stake in this country. Learning things the hard way when it involves the economy which affects everyone is not a good way to go, no matter how well it plays with your base.

The wheels of government continue spinning and it would behove us to remember there are issues which need to be addressed other the 1MDB issue, which is already taken care of by numerous divisions of the government. Government and reforming the institutions is not a single-issue project. 

With this in mind, will we ever discover what happened to Pastor Koh and all the others who mysteriously disappeared? If ever there was a time to seek clarification on this issue, it is now.

Citizens of this country were kidnapped in a paramilitary style and all circumstantial evidence points to the connivance of the state. At this point, I am less interested in why Pastor Koh was kidnapped but who ordered the kidnapping. I get that the inspector-general of police (IGP) has vowed to look into this issue, but it really does not inspire confidence.

People tend to look to politicians to solve our problems especially here in Malaysia, but it really is not like that in many functional democracies. Independent credible institutions are what people believe in because politicians have other agendas. The "vanishings" of Pastor Koh, Amri Che Mat, Joshua Hilmy and his wife, Ruth Sitepu, are troubling because circumstantial evidence points to state actors, who may have been working without the knowledge of the Umno state.

While the former Umno state may be complicit in covering these crimes, what we have been witness to so far is that because the country was run by an incompetent kleptocrat, there have been factions within the government who may have been operating without supervision. This is what happens when the machinery of government is used to cover up the alleged crimes of their political masters and nobody is interested in minding the house.

In May this year, “the wife of the missing activist Amri Che Mat, Norhayati Mohd Ariffin, has urged police to investigate a claim that her husband was abducted by a Special Branch (SB) team from Bukit Aman on Nov 24, 2016.” While Bukit Aman predictably said they would look into it, the important question still remains.

At this point, the why is not as important as who ordered the disappearance of Pastor Koh and the other activists.

Unanswered questions

Who had the power (if this allegation is true) to order a tactical squad to kidnap Malaysians for whatever reasons? Who had the authority to issue such commands and who felt secure enough that their crime would go unsanctioned by the former Umno state? Who had the political influence to concoct such a manoeuvre which bypasses the traditional state security apparatus and mete out whatever fate that befell these people?

Whoever these people are they were confident that the narratives of the state security apparatus would shield them from whatever repercussions of the former Umno state and, here is the important part, may very well shield them from the sanctions of the Pakatan Harapan regime.

At this point, their motives may be implied but what is really important is that their identities are shielded from the public. If you believe that an Uber driver acted on his own in the Pastor Koh kidnapping, then it is the end of the story. However, let us forget about the who ordered these kidnappings for a moment. Why would anyone want to shield the masterminds of these crimes? I can think of three possibilities.

1. The magnitude of this conspiracy, if true, could threaten national security. This is especially true if it involves non-mainstream ideological imperatives. I doubt the former regime, or the current one, would want to be in a position to explain to the rakyat that there are elements within the government who had the means to carry out unsanctioned operations against citizens based on agendas that have nothing to do with local sensibilities.

2. The security apparatus wants to cover its own behind. How does it look that the state security apparatus was so compromised, so willing to do the dirty work of their political masters like spying on citizens and the former opposition that they did not realise that they were elements within their ranks who had the motive and the means to carry out unsanctioned operations?

(Remember Ku Li knows the game is rigged - “(Bagaimanapun) jangan memandang rendah kepada kerajaan kerana mereka ada kuasa, ada televisyen, radio, duit dan media. Mereka juga ada alat-alat risikan dan sebagainya. Media dia lebih tahu pada kita. Dia tahu kita belum tahu lagi. Sama ada dengan kekuasaan itu, parti yang berkuasa akan kalah saya tidak tahu.”)

3. This, of course, is the most insidious. There are true believers in the state security apparatus who for whatever reasons, believe that protecting those involved is part of their obligations. Understand now, that I am merely spitballing here. I do this because the evidence points to a certain direction and when a compromised state security apparatus tell me they are looking into it, it merely means that they are hoping our attentions are focused someplace else.

For those of us who do not believe that there are Uber drivers out there kidnapping Malaysians, the only other possibility is that there are elements in the state who sanctioned such operations.

Who knows, they could even be mingling in the corridors of Harapan power.

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S THAYAPARAN is Commander (Rtd) of the Royal Malaysian Navy. - Mkini