rights and police

15 persons turned up for the suaram ‘know your rights’ workshop on 8 may. it was good to know that out of the 15, all the 3 major races were represented. oh yes, only 3 were men!

the workshop began with a welcoming address by choo chon kai, penang’s suaram’s co-ordinator. penang suaram had engaged the service of mr arutchelvan a/l subramaniam (arut for short) from suaram KL to give most of the talk.

the talk began with the very basic of ‘what is human rights’, the concept and undertanding of it. we were given some life situations to ponder on to see where human rights had been trampled. this was followed by ‘human rights and law’. this was rather interesting as we were made to jog our mind on the differences between human rights and law. as many would have already realised, indeed the law interfere with human rights in many situations. (of course someone would add ‘especially so in a country like ours with ISA, OSA around).

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there was a fun interactive part when we were asked to pick a piece of paper with the occupation written and acted out our occupation. half the participants were boses while half were workers and both groups were told to write down what rights they want to demand. (workers from bosses and vice versa). after holding the placards (actually just a piece of A4 size writing paper) with our demanded ‘rights’ written on them, we were told to try to snatch each other’s placard while holding on tight to our own of course. well it was not surprising that i did not managed to snatch any but instead lost my placard! ha! mr arut told us that this excersise sort of tells us that the strong usually win when in a ‘battle’. well, i’m short and small so consider not strong lah. 🙂

next we were presented with the universal declaration of human rights (UDHR). the articles of the UDHR were summarised for us and again we were given some life situation stories and to pick which article of the UDHR had been violated.

after this, there was a 20 mins. video presentation of ‘human rights situation in malaysia’ produced by suaram. dr kua kio siong (hope i get the name right) and farish noor were featured in the video, among others. sharing on what role human rights group in our country play in view of the human rights situation followed.

the most intereting part came after lunch, i.e. the talk on the topic ‘police power’. participants were called up by mr arut to demonstrate some situation that he wanted to explain to us. for example what should we do when a police stop us and ask for our IC, or ask you to follow him to the police station. should we show our IC/follow him, even after we asked the police for his ID and find out he is a police? no, mr arut said. what we should do is to ask the police for surat 111. what is this surat 111? it’s simply a notice under section 111 that says arahan menghadiri penyiasatan di bawah seksyen 111, kanun acara jenayah.

so remember next time when a police stop you in the middle of the road or while you were having roti canai and teh tarik, and asked you to follow him, ask him for surat 111.

please take note that this surat 111 has a ‘7 miles power’. what does this means? this means let’s say the surat 111 came from a police station located in jalan AA, where the police stop you must be 7 miles within jalan AA. so if the surat 111 come from say a police station in tanjung bungah, is use to stop me in bayan baru, it has no power!

also, please note that there must be an officer present. ask for the surat 111 and also for an officer, if you don’t see one around. it seems that in almost any situation, you must make sure that an officer is around (or a surat with the officer signature). even during police road-block on the road, there must be an officer.

let’s look at the example of some policemen come knocking on your door asking you to open the door to let them in. what should you do? should you open the door and let them in? the correct thing to do is first asked the police which station were they sent from, then phone the station to find out if they (the station) had indeed sent some of their men to your house.

remember when the police carry out a search* in your house, there must be an inspector or officer present, and while the police went about searching, you have the right to follow the police wherever he goes to keep an eye on him. then if the police took some of your things from your house, they must give you a surat pemeriksaan, in which all the items taken by them will be listed down.
*contrary to what many believe, to carry out a search in a house, the police need a search warrant, mr arut said no not necessary so.

we were also taught how to differentiate the different kind of police ranks by their uniform, badge (on arms) and ID. btw, to sidetrack, police here doesn’t mean only the criminal police or traffic police but others as well like the FRU (federal reserve unit) and PGA (pasukan gerak awam).

for the FRU, it was interesting to learn that the colours of their ID differentiate them. a blue ID is an officer, yellow ID a non officer, white ID temporary police like RELA and red ID means he has been suspended.

the final part of the workshop was when someone else took over. (sorry forgot his name but he’s from penang’s suaram). we started off by role play of some situations where human rights were violated, and then we were shown how to make a report.

before we parted, we were presented with suaram’s ‘malaysian human rights report 2003’ book (picture below). we were told that the 2004 report would come out only in august. i found out later on suaram website, the book cost RM30! how nice of suaram.

there are much more to tell but i can’t tell all as it will be too long. the best thing, dear friends, is next time, when there is such a workshop, go sign up and attend it. it will be interesting and very worthwhile, i tell you. you will learn so much just as i did. thank you to suaram penang for organising this.