Former law minister Zaid Ibrahim has concurred with PKR lawmaker Hassan Abdul Karim that a criminal investigation is not negotiable.
However, he said it must be difficult for the police to gather evidence when the complainant has filed a separate report stating that the kerfuffle has been resolved and that he does not wish to prolong the matter.
“It’s heartening to have an MP like Hassan always defending the sovereignty of the law. But in our country, the law only works or operates in limited spaces,” he added in a social media post.
Both Zaid and Hassan were referring to the case where a bodyguard of a royal was accused of assaulting a 46-year-old disabled e-hailing driver outside a hotel in Kuala Lumpur.
The former minister also cited the case of M Indira Gandhi, accusing the authorities of being selective when it comes to matters related to race, religion or royalty, otherwise known as 3R cases.
“Why do you think that a Hindu mother could not find her daughter after 15 long years despite explicit instruction from the Federal Court to the police to search and bring her to the mother’s arms? Probably because religion was involved,” he added.
On Tuesday, Indira claimed there were no serious efforts by the police to detain her ex-husband K Pathmanathan (Muslim name is Muhammad Riduan Abdullah) and to locate her 16-year-old daughter.
Her daughter was still an infant when her husband abducted her in 2009 after converting to Islam. Indira and her ex-husband were locked in a protracted legal tussle over the unilateral conversion of their children to Islam.
3R an ‘idiotic policy’
Zaid, who also mentioned the recent attacks on football players which the police had cautioned the public against speculating about royal links, said the measures against 3R are “the most idiotic policy I have ever encountered in my life.”
Pointing out that most Malaysians are mature enough to deal with issues involving the 3R, the former minister urged Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim to remove the policy and repeal the Sedition Act.
“The government must know that complex problems must involve the public if the sovereignty of the law is to have meaning,” he added.
Previously, veteran journalist A Kadir Jasin had also criticised the “3R” policy as a “creature of politics” and an “instrument of control”.
He also pointed out that it is common for discussions on such topics to arise in a multireligious and multiracial nation.
“We also have the most number of sultans and rajas (compared to) any country in the world. If having many religions, races and monarchs (was) ‘sensitive’, logically Malaysia wouldn’t or shouldn’t have existed.
“So there’s nothing sensitive about the 3Rs of religion, race and royalty. These elements are entrenched in our constitution,” he added. - Mkini
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