HRP going through bureaucratic grind

The Registrar of Societies has maintained a silence over the HRP's application to be registered as a political party

ANALYSIS - FMT

Government departments in Malaysia, whether federal or state, have their respective Client’s Charter which spells out the A to Z details of the processes involved in getting anything done through the bureaucracy.

The Registrar of Societies (ROS) is no exception. Its Client’s Charter promises that any application to register an organisation would be speedily disposed of within four months. Applicants would be advised, irrespective of whether they succeeded or failed, within that period.

An exception seems to have been made by the ROS, for no rhyme or reason, in the case of the Human Rights Party (HRP) Malaysia. It was clearly not informed by the ROS about the status of its application within its own four-month timeframe. The ROS should explain this obvious discrimination against the party or risk being exposed as doing the bidding of the ruling Umno, and its poodle, the MIC.

The HRP had sent several reminders to the ROS since June 18, 2009 to March 14, 2011 but to no avail.
Before June 18, 2009 the registration bid was under the Parti Reformasi Insan Malaysia (PRIM) and after that under HRP. The party lodged all the necessary forms on Nov 25, 2010 when there was no reply to the June 18 letter requesting the forms. PRIM, in fact, first applied for registration in 2000.

The ROS waited until the matter was in court before mischievously replying to the HRP on Aug 4, 2011 that its application had been rejected on two specific grounds. The hands of the court were thus tied at the 11th hour. To add insult to injury, the ROS callously got an Indian civil servant by the name of Dasmond Das a/l Michael Das to convey the bad news vide a covering letter. The attached notification itself had to be signed, as it was, by the ROS, Abdul Rahman Othman.

The first ground for rejection was that the application was “not in order” in line with what the ROS wanted and, secondly, that “there were issues with the party constitution”.

The ROS did not spell out the specific details on the two grounds for rejection, thereby underlining that these were feeble attempts at afterthoughts. The ROS has obviously to work out the specifics which could be as simple as sending in the application forms in triplicate when the ROS needs four copies.

Splitting hairs

The ROS, generally, splits hairs on these two – organisation and constitution – subjective issues.
Besides, its hands are virtually tied and there’s little that it can do to prevent the registration, eventually, of any organisation.

Left unspoken was the stark reality that the “onus” is on applicants to get back to the ROS within two weeks of lodging an application to enquire on its status. The ROS would generally have some questions on the proposed constitution of an applicant’s organisation. These must be put in order before clearance is sought, it’s known, from the Special Branch on the applicants.

The HRP clearly did not get back to the ROS within two weeks and did not follow up personally with the department. HRP pro-tem secretary-general P Uthayakumar, when asked about this earlier this year, rightly took the position that the onus should be on the ROS to get back to the applicant and not vice-versa.

He reiterated the same position when asked again recently. Nevertheless, he conceded that HRP treasurer A Sukumaran followed up personally, on his own accord, with the ROS on the party’s application but to no avail.

If an applicant has previously been detained under the Internal Security Act (ISA), as was the case with Uthayakumar, the Special Branch would not respond to any enquiry from the ROS. Otherwise, the Special Branch would signal that “there’s no file on the applicant”, meaning “the applicant is not a security threat”.
It’s not known whether other government departments and/or other interests have to be consulted as well.

In the case of the Malaysian Dayak Congress (MDC) it’s known that the Parti Rakyat Sarawak (PRS), led by James Masing, objected to the former’s formation. Both were then making their bids for registration after the Parti Bansa Dayak Sarawak (PBDS) was deregistered.

MDC was subsequently advised by the ROS, unofficially, that its application could not be approved “on national security grounds” and because “there were too many political parties”. MDC hesitated to take the matter to court to test these ROS theories despite the fact that it was in violation of Article 10 1(c) of the Federal Constitution.

Grounds for rejection

Moving forward, lawyers in the know feel the HRP would have to write officially to the ROS and ask for specifics on the two grounds for rejection of its application for registration.

The ROS is unlikely to reply, according to sources familiar with the mechanics.

It would be a different matter if Uthayakumar makes an effort to meet with the ROS personally and get the necessary details. But knowing the man, many of his supporters feel that he’s unlikely to bother with such an approach

This would clearly play into the ROS’ hands and set in motion a chain of events which will see Uthayakumar in court on yet another day on the same issue with the same applications in tow, thagt is, judicial review, mandamus and certiorari.

“Uthayakumar would have to decide whether he, like the ROS, wants to play politics with the issue of registering the HRP or call the latter’s bluff”, say political leaders in Kuala Lumpur who pleaded anonymity.

In short, according to them, he would be well-advised to march to Putrajaya, drop by the ROS and “take the bull by the horns”.

Writing numerous reminder letters to the ROS, no doubt, would not get him anywhere but would simply see him back in court before a judge whose hands would have been tied by both the parties in the dispute bent on engaging in what would increasingly be seen as a game of cat-and-mouse but to avail.

At this time of writing, the HRP is preparing to appeal to the home minister over the ROS rejecting the party’s application, according to Uthayakumar. The party would at the same time give the home minister/ROS two weeks to register the party, failing which they would be back in court once again clutching the same applications.