Teoh's death: The answer is in the next elections!

OPINION Our nation has produced varying responses to the violent death of one of her young sons, Teoh Beng Hock. These reactions shed some light on our political system and collective conscience.

Ordinary Malaysians have expressed shock, dismay, and anger. Demonstrations and candle-light vigils have begun, symbolising an outpouring of sympathy for Teoh’s fiancée and family, and anger that the MACC has washed its hands in public and shrugged off any responsibility.

Leaders spanning the political spectrum, from the MCA’s Dr Chua Soi Lek, Umno Youth’s Khairy Jamaluddin, to PAS Vice-President Salahuddin Ayob, the PKR’s Anwar Ibrahim, the DAP’s Lim Kit Siang, and the national human rights commission Suhakam, have called for an independent Royal Commission to reveal the truth.

A glance at the huge number of readers’ comments on news portals like the Malaysian Mirror, and blogs like Malaysia Today, reveals an explosion of rage and mourning. Readers demand an unfettered investigation. Some call for divine justice. A few call for retaliation.

Some, including blogger Rocky’s Bru, condemn politicians such as the DAP’s Lim Guan Eng for trying to gain political mileage from the young DAP aide’s death. Yet it is undeniable that Teoh’s death is deeply political, for Teoh died during an MACC probe targeted at Pakatan Rakyat (PR) representatives.

The MACC has not answered allegations of corruption among Barisan Nasional representatives, such as Dr Mohd Khir Toyo, with nearly the same fanatical hounding the MACC has given PR reps. After Teoh’s death, Khir blurted out disingenuous claims that he thought the MACC to be even-handed. He alleged that he, too, had been questioned by the MACC, for eight hours, a “similar treatment” to Teoh’s. It can be assumed Khir’s “similar treatment” did not involve a fall from a tall building.

One or two readers of news sites and blogs said Teoh “must have been guilty” of some unspecified crime. They claimed that otherwise, Teoh would not have been called in for questioning. One reader said Teoh must have felt guilty after being interrogated, and, as a result, jumped to his death. In response, other readers directed furious tirades at the abject stupidity of these remarks.

But then the Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department, Nazri Aziz, sprang to the MACC’s defence. The minister said the MACC had told him they had released Teoh after questioning him. “Don’t just accuse MACC for being responsible for this, wait for the investigation… (Teoh) should have gone home. We couldn’t have known he wanted to jump from that building,” he argued.

Angry readers and journalists poured scorn on the minister’s purported telepathic knowledge that Teoh had jumped, and had not been pushed. Perhaps the honourable minister felt he should be appointed as chairman and sole member of the investigative commission, since he seems to have superhuman insight.

Well-rehearsed response

Leading Cabinet ministers recited identikit lines in a well-rehearsed response: the police were mounting an investigation, and no one should reach premature conclusions (except, it seems, for one psychic Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department).

Deputy PM Muhyiddin Yassin told Malaysians to “stay calm” and not to over-react. He set a proud example of not over-reacting himself, appearing impassive and completely unmoved by the death of a young MACC witness – a young man planning to be married that day.

At first, Muhyiddin paid scant attention to demands for a Royal Commission. The next day, he backtracked, and said the Cabinet, at its meeting next Wednesday, would “consider” a royal investigative panel.

The strength of public feeling must have shaken his earlier stand that the public would have to await the results of police investigations. Muhyiddin had claimed the police would be “hands on” and would “leave no stone unturned.”

Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak offered his condolences to Teoh’s family. Najib said, "The government hopes that the people will remain calm and patient. Let's leave it to the authorities to investigate."

Is this a tenable proposition?

Teoh died after falling from the building where he had been interrogated by the MACC for almost eleven hours. The MACC were the authorities, and the authorities were already investigating. They were investigating PR members of the Selangor State Assembly.

The MACC must have placed enormous pressure on Teoh, the young political secretary to the DAP’s Executive Councillor Ean Yong Hian Wah, during that long night.

Teoh could not be reached on his mobile telephone: he had been isolated and deprived of communication with the outside world. The MACC officers questioning Teoh have not been named. The MACC have not offered an official version of the events of that night. There was no camera coverage of the interrogation.

Tan Boon Hwa, Kajang Municipal Councillor, was interrogated by the MACC on the same evening as Teoh. He accused MACC officers of trying to extract a fake confession from him. He says the MACC forced him to stay on his feet from 10pm to 2am, and threatened him with physical violence.

Teoh must have been deprived of sleep too, and may have been deprived of food and water. The MACC admitted Teoh had been “tired”. It does not require any stretch of the imagination to deduce that Teoh may well have been harassed and abused, as Tan described.

Teoh’s lawyer, M Manoharan, said the MACC would not allow him to accompany Teoh. Even if Teoh had been a criminal suspect in police custody, rather than an MACC witness, he would have had the right to seek legal advice. The MACC violated the rule of natural justice.

Who guards “the authorities”?

The question remains: who guards the guardians? If the police investigation is to be “hands on”, as Muhyiddin boasted, will this bring us closer to the truth?

The police left plenty of evidence of being “hands on”, when they beat Kugan Ananthan in police custody in January. The police have been silent on the result of the investigation, classified as murder. Kugan, a previously healthy and strapping 22 year old man, died bearing signs of having been flogged by police. The police then confiscated material evidence from Kugan’s post-mortem examination in Universiti Malaya. The “authorities” also fell back on technicalities in court, slowing down efforts by Manoharan, also Kugan’s lawyer, from retrieving the seized evidence.

The Public Prosecutor’s Office, the MACC, the police, and the judiciary have become profoundly politicised. The public perception is that they have become organs of state-sanctioned violence, and that the “authorities” have lost their moral authority.

“Leave it to the authorities”? Malaysians may provide a resounding answer to this question in the next elections.

Malaysia’s police, judiciary and civil service were once respected throughout the world. We have now become an international anomaly. Malaysia is a self-declared democracy, with a proud history of independence and self-determination. Yet our nation is now wracked with unprecedented, catastrophic scandals, hobbling our constitution, such as in Perak, and our state institutions, such as the police and the MACC. Our state institutions can be returned to health, but only if voters insist on accountability and new blood.

In the final analysis, though, these state institutions exist merely to serve people; to serve Malaysians. The most abiding and memorable response to this tragedy, the response that matters most, is not to be found in the politicians’ speeches, the blogs, or in the headlines. It is to be found in the image of Teoh’s grieving fiancée and family, burned indelibly into our collective memory.