By R.Sivarasa
SHAH ALAM: It is just over 11 years since Anwar Ibrahim, newly sacked as deputy prime minister, was first slapped with trumped-up charges of sodomy and supposed corruption 
As a result he spent six years in detention in Sungei Bulu Prison, in solitary confinement throughout, with contact only with his family and lawyers.
Finally, after his nemesis, former Prime Minister Dr. Mahathir Mohamed was reluctantly forced into retirement in October 2003, Anwar was acquitted and released on 2 September 2004 at the final level of his appeal against the conviction for sodomy.
Now the nightmare is starting all over again. (The trail has been fixed for a month from Jan 25).
On 16 July 2008, Anwar was arrested on a new charge of sodomy, after a report was lodged on 28th June 2008 by a junior aide in his office Saiful Bukhari. Anwar says that the charge is, again, politically motivated, and a renewed attempt to scuttle his political career which has revived dramatically, against all the odds, since his release.
Most people both inside and outside the country agree with this assessment.
The new case replays an old script with new actors – the current script also shows the previous episode’s features of political interference, manipulation of officers in the AG’s Chambers and police, and falsification of evidence all arising from a political conspiracy to stop Anwar’s political career.
A truly suspicious case
There are many facts about the current allegations made by Saiful and his behaviour which are already in the public domain. These facts speak for themselves and immediately show the lack of substance in the fabricated case now brought to attempt to bring down Anwar.
Saiful claimed in his police report of 28th June 2008 made at Hospital Kuala Lumpur (“HKL”) that he was sodomised by Anwar on the afternoon of Thursday 26th June 2008 at a condominium in Bukit Damansara. His version to the police in his police statement appears to allege that he had been assaulted about 8 to 9 times against his will by Anwar over the previous two months. In his police report made two days later on 28th June 2008, he claims that this incident of sodomy was also against his will.
This version immediately raises suspicion as to why this so-called “victim” is sodomised 8 to 9 times against his will over two months and yet made no complaint to the authorities. During that time, he was in regular contact with Anwar and all the other office staff at Anwar’s office.
It has also been revealed that on Wednesday 25th June 2008, the day before the last so-called assault on Thursday, he had met with a senior police officer Senior Assistant Commissioner Rodwan Mohd Yusof ( then Deputy Director of Criminal Investigation Dept of the Royal Malaysian Police Force, now CPO Melaka ) in the Concorde Hotel in KL at Room 619.
When asked by journalists about this meeting, Rodwan said he had no comment. Rodwan had played a key role in the police team in Anwar’s 1998/9 cases and in particular was infamous for his role in illegally using Anwar’s blood sample for DNA testing and was also embroiled in allegations of planting fabricated DNA traces on the infamous mattress brought to court.
In the first trial in 1999, the DNA evidence was so discredited that even the hostile trial judge Augustine Paul was forced to expunge the evidence to assist the prosecution.
It has also since been revealed that the “victim” also met the current Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak ( then the Deputy Prime Minister ) a few days prior to the alleged incident.
What is interesting about this revelation is that Najib initially denied meeting Saiful to the media, then admitted it, then said the meeting took place because Saiful ( a university drop-out ) was asking him for assistance to get a scholarship, and then told the media that Saiful said he was sodomised by Anwar and looked traumatised during their meeting.
Saiful’s behaviour after the so-called assault on that Thursday also raises questions.
The next morning, Saiful went to the Anwar’s office as usual. He made no complaints to anyone and appeared quite normal. Later that day, he attended an Anwar Ibrahim Club event at Anwar’s house, at which Anwar was also present. There he helped serve coffee to the dozen or so persons present, showed no signs of fear or anxiety, and was able to sit and stand without showing any signs of discomfort.
The following day on Saturday in the afternoon about 2 pm, Saiful decided to go to a private hospital called Pusat Rawatan Islam ( PUSRAWI ) in Jalan Tun Razak. There he complained to one Dr. Osman that he had pain in his anus for a few days and that a “plastic” item had been inserted.
A proctoscopy examination by Dr. Osman showed no physical signs of penetration and a normal anus and rectum. After the examination, he then told Dr. Osman he had been sodomised by a VIP and was then advised to go for an examination at a government hospital.
Despite HKL being virtually across the road, it took Saiful two and a half hours to get there. At HKL, where he reported that he had been sodomised, he was examined by three specialist doctors, which was a very unusual procedure in itself.
These three doctors, in their official report, have stated that there were no ““no conclusive clinical findings suggestive of penetration to the anus …” again reinforcing the conclusions of Dr. Osman.
Any objective investigator would have understood that a prosecution for sodomy would get nowhere in the light of such clear medical evidence. No objective prosecutor would have allowed the case to progress.
Here we see the opposite – the investigation being driven fully although from the outset, the medical evidence itself ruled out penetration. The malice in the investigation further confirms the involvement of political motives.
This investigation was pursued despite the medical findings which would have been made available immediately to police investigators. Swabs taken from Saiful suspiciously took two days to reach the chemist lab for analysis.
We know now that the prosecution will rely on purported DNA evidence to attempt to prove that Anwar was involved in an act of sodomy with Saiful without his consent.
How a 61 year old man with a bad back can force himself on a fit and tall 24 year old man will be an interesting question for all observers of this political trial.
The other interesting question will be, in the light of the emphatic medical evidence that there are no clinical findings even suggestive of penetration, the lack of credibility of any DNA report purporting to show Anwar’s DNA was found in Saiful’s rectum.
Such a report would in fact raise suspicion about the credibility of such DNA evidence – i.e. that such evidence had been fabricated or tampered with which is easy to do with DNA evidence especially when the perpetrators are the investigators themselves as in the 1998 trials.
TOMORROW Part 2 of Sodomy Conspiracy: Examples of fabrication of evidence to implicate Anwar
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