Sunday, April 01, 2007

Royal Pain

Immunity For Royalty?
Why do I get the feeling that this is a throwback to those awful pre-constitutional crisis period when Royalty, particularly kin of the ruling royalty, could get away with anything.
The story is out in M-Star online. Its editor Fathi Aris has it in his Patah Balek blog. Rocky's Bru too.
And Susan Loone's two-parter, "the prince, the lady and, the policeman" and "the prince, the lady and the policeman (2)".

We should already have been reading this story in the newspapers.
I'd think that any newspaper worth its salt should be following up on it.
Then I am remembering the directive issued to the mainstream media to not follow up on stories in the blogs.
I'd like to see if they follow this instruction to a T.

In a nutshell: A prince from a southern state beat up (oh yes) mistress for having an affair with a married policeman.
This is not really the story.

This is: Prince got the mistress' lover transferred, within 24 hours, to Sarawak to undertake "desk duties".
Mistress, a young lady, (20-something) attempted to lodge a police report in Johor but no one wanted to take down her report. She had to go all the way to Bukit Aman in Kuala Lumpur.

It seems threats had been made to her family.
Her 52 year-old father, fearing for his safety and that of his family, has lodged a police report in Johor Bahru.

Rocky came into possession of a copy of the police report. So did many others, apparently. You'd know the father's name as well as the young lady in question. (Read it in Rocky's posting.)

I remember, back in the early 80s, during the first constitutional crisis, how Dr Mahathir went around the country explaining to the people why there was a need to amend the constitution (regarding the Rulers' assent to Bills) and again in 1993, to remove the legal immunity from prosecution of all the rulers (in their personal capacity). The latter followed the Sultan of Johor's assault on a hockey coach and teacher, Douglas Gomez.
Dr M knew what he was up against. But he had the government, the party and the people behind him, with him all the way.
It was the people's victory.

This is a comment by The Scribe A Kadir Jasin, in Rocky's Bru:

"Sdr Rocky,
When a coach of the Johor Youth Hockey Team was allegedly beaten up for sidelining a Johor prince in a tournament, the NST and The Malay Mail broke the story.
Others followed.That incident sparked off the 2nd constitutional crisis, which led to the amendment of the Constitution which took away the immunity of the Rulers and the members of the royal family except in the performance of their official duties.
Beating up people, cheating business partners and getting involved in pub brawls are not official duties surely.
Our brother Dato’ Syed Nazri was in the thick of it then.
I was the NSTSB group editor.
When I asked then PM, Tun Dr Mahathir, about our reporting, he said it was entirely up to us.
We took the risk and the people won.
We have to continue to defend that victory.It does not mean that when a PM is made a member of the royal family by being awarded Darjah Kerabat, he should side with the raja and neglect the rakyat.
This kind of incident, if not properly handled, will make mockery of the hadhari campaign, which is supposedly founded on civilization and civility.
Don’t you feel that our beloved Malaysia is slowly sinking into a state of lawlessness?
Please tell me that I am wrong!
Thank you."

A police report has been lodged. We should be expecting a police investigation to be underway. If the injured/aggrieved party/parties are denied the course and process of justice because of royal bullying and interference, then we may as well take a huge leap back into time.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Can Malaysia ignore what the blogs are doing to seek justice for the ordinary citizen?

I hope the police investigate the case without fear and favour. This is when AAB can redeem a little of his disatrous premiership, by reassuring the people that justice shall prevail. The PM has to stop not knowing everything! And Zam should instruct the papers to follow up. Unless he is still spooked by his meeting with the Johor Sultan that took place more than a decade ago when he was the editor in chief of Utusan.

Anonymous said...

I wrote this earlier in Rocky's Bru.

This story about this Yasmin's story unable to do a police report will most probably not get into the mainstream media print.

The folks in the kampungs, especially the Johoreans, will not get to know about this.

Their perception about the Tunku Mahkota Johor is very high, especially the TMJ's annual Kembara Mahkota where he and the family travels all over the state, on motorbikes visiting the most boondocks of places, sleeping in the most meagre kampung folks home, eating their everyday regular meals, diligently for a few years now. This is a very popular mesra rakyat annual event which is very highly regarded.

To them, Tunku Ibrahim Ismail is a model Sultan Johor in-waiting. This family also spent a lot of time, money and effort with the Johor flood victims in too many relief centres last December-January flood in Johor.

Not many of these folks have access to internet, let alone blogs. So their perception of Tunku Ibrahim is expected to be high and they would still want him to replace his father when Sultan Iskandar dies. The fact that his son, Tunku Ismail Ibrahim is made the Raja Muda shows how much Sultan Iskandar is making sure the lineage is set.

Unless the case against Tunku Ibrahim made by this Yasmin and/or her father is solid enough to warrant IGP to instruct full investigations and build up a case so that the DPP is able to prosecute him, then all these discussions are just opinionated.

Even that, the DPP has to prosecute Tunku Ibrahim in a Special Tribunal, not in regular criminal courts. That is provided by the amended constitution which Dr. Mahathir revoked the immunity of the Royals on private capacity, back in 1993.

So many limitations to this episode. That is why no real case have ever been successfully brought against any royals in this country, even though the law that provided immunity against they private conduct has been repealed in the 1993 Constitution amendments (14 years ago).

Maybe impressionable young ladies be careful who they befriend (which they have a choice) and not get themselves into these sort of perils, which the system simply does not allow them for a recourse.

Anonymous said...

Tante ena

Believe me, nothing's going to be done. Mark my word.

Jay

Shanghai Fish said...

jay_han took the words out of my mouth.
Of course nothing will be done...How can the main stream media or politicians take a bloggers cue ?... remember all we spew is lies !Come on my dear, none of these people have got the guts to admit their short-commings.And no matter what the crime these royals do..even before you question them you have to beg for their forgiveness ..just don't make sense..by the way is this the same family that barged and beat up a Brazilian wedding party in drunken stupor ? I fear for the girls family !

Anonymous said...

kak aina, tak payahlah pergi jauh sangat sampai ke Istana Bukit Serene atau Istana Pasir Pelangi (kalau betul lah berita ni, tapi entahlah).

Cukuplah apa yang saya sendiri lalui Khamis lalu. Seorang rakyat Johor yang bergelar, by birth (keturunan arab) and by medal (Datuk la, apa lagi).

Bekas isterinya menuntut mutaah di mahkamah syariah di Shah Alam, wartawan datang membuat liputan, termasuk saya sendiri, tetapi office tak mahu pakai story tu sebab kerana dia orang berdarjat dan pejabat peguamnya sudah menitipkan supaya cerita si isteri jangan sampai ke mata telinga orang ramai, sedangkan mahkamah syariah shah alam tidak pun mengeluarkan arahan supaya prosiding mahkamah tidak dilaporkan media massa. ha macam mana tu?

saya dapat rasa macam another Aida Melly case in making.

Anonymous said...

hi Kak Ena,
this not the first time Kak Ena. memang habis gitu je selama ni. apa yang jay_han kata memang betul.

apa yang saya harap tak sama dengan apa yang saya rasa akan berlaku, everytime.

Anonymous said...

Citizens,

Sabar ! This is why the Federal Constitution is so important in every aspect of our being here in Malaysia.It should always be abided with. In this country even the cats and dogs seek justice (by humans) for if abused or worse. I read in yesterday's Weekend Mail of this market in Guangzhou,China where daily, cats and dogs are slaughtered or near slaughtered for human consumption.Poor things,sigh! So guys,be optimistic and go by the law.

Doogie Howser MD

Anonymous said...

to The Scribe A Kadir Jasin...

you are WRONG... DEAD wrong!... which in your case has always been the norm rather than the exception.

how many new laws have been introduced and how many amendments have been made to existing laws since 1957?

one does not need to be a Perry Mason to see the vast difference.

the REAL problem lies in the ENFORCEMENT of these laws!... which in our case is almost negligible... well, SELECTIVE at best.

our problem is that our beloved Malaysia is fast degenerating into a state of SELECTIVE prosecution.

however, contrary to popular local beliefs this selective prosecution isn't race-based but more along the lines of politics and finance... you got money and connections you get a GET OUT OF JAIL FREE card... need I say more?

furthermore, another of your logic has gone askew when you wrote, "When I asked then PM, Tun Dr Mahathir, about our reporting, he said it was entirely up to us. We took the risk and the people won."

firstly, you were actually doing the then PM a BIG favour, am I not correct?

so, would anyone in his position object to this "offer"?

duh!

secondly, if the PM himself gave you the green light, what risk were talking about? ("... We took the risk and the people won... ")

did the people actually win or did you?

again... duh!

after all, we all KNOW the real Malaysian way... don't we?

finally, a sycophant will always remain a sycophant although the usual excuse is called "diplomacy"... I think?

what am I talking about?

well... a hint, "This kind of incident, if not properly handled, will make mockery of the hadhari campaign, which is supposedly founded on civilization and civility."

now, where is that barf bag of mine?

Anonymous said...

hey there..will miss mee rebus tomorrow as will be in machap. anyway, one good thing that Dr M did was remove the privilege that royalty was above the law...our royalty now more like gangster ke? so shy shy shy.........:D