corruption – main complaint

the royal police commission, after a public survey, found out that the many of the over 400 complaints they received touch on corruption. now why am i not surprise. corruption seems to be the most rampant crime that had been happening almost everywhere… even affecting the cabinet of course. (speaking of which, i wonder what happened to pak lah’s promise of catching the big… or small fish for corruption. this matter had suddenly been silent.)

police corruption is something very common. if you are talking about traffic police, even a child will know how to say “give the datuk kopi duit and no more fine”. however, this finding of the royal police commision speaks more on not the traffic police. there were even complaints of corruption/bribery happening right in the police lock-up where detainees were being held. for example the detainees were denied their rights to use a phone to made a call. instead they a policeman will offer the use of his handphone for a fee, say RM100 a call.

another common complaint was the fear of police inaction over police report lodged. yes, i guess most of us had experienced this. how many times do we hear “balik tunggu panggilan” (go home and wait for our call) or something akin to that, but after we ‘balik’, we wait and wait and nothing happens. i suppose this is link to another complaint -selective attention given to special people – if you are a nobody, the police couldn’t care about your report but if you are a VIP, they would act fast.

the royal police commission had been set up by pak lah not too long ago, when pak lah was very aware that the public had lost its confidence towards the police. (i had blog on the royal police commission here and here). a commission is needed to look after the police who are suppose to look after us. when the names of the person chosen to head this commission were given, some people were not satisfied with the lineup of members. and there were many criticisms hurled at the royal commission too… were they be doing their duties responsibly? transparent? having hearings in the open? according to DAP chairman, lim kit siang, no. to quote from him (last few paragraphs of the article):

“The lack of confidence in the commission can be seen from the poor public response, when hearings were conducted in various parts of the country. I believe the problem is purely one of miscommunication and poor public relations or it might even be something more fundamental.The growing lack of public confidence in the Royal Commission may be because of its composition, its name and method of operation. For instance, the commission had initially undertaken to conduct
proceedings in an open manner but they reneged on their agreement by having no public hearing.”