Of inquest, request, no quest and ...

Say what you want...the inquest starts with a "no go"...

1. Dumbfounded.That' the word I would use to describe the inquest into the death of BH Teoh.
2. The stage has been set since last week reaching its peak when Najib met with the Teohs' yesterday fulfilling his pledge to meet them before the start of the inquest despite his busy schedule.
3. Tup..Tup... the anti-climax, courtesy of Dobind Singh Deo. Why the adjournment? Gobind cited practise direction number 1 of 2007 Guidelines of Inquest - section C on the notice of inquest. With that, the court adjourned the inquest to 5th August 2009.
4. My questions to Gobind's action :-
   • If he knew beforehand that he wanted to cite direction number 1 of 2007, why must he wait until the inquest starts? Can't he just meet the coroner aka magistrate beforehand or made known his intention to the courts and save everyone's time to come to court only to experience that the inquest will be adjourned?
   • Is this another political act for political mileage? Is PR especially DAP turning it into a political circus and thus diverting the real issues which is the alledged DAP's practice in disbursing funds allocated to the state representatives?
   • If PR and DAP is sincere in helping the Teohs', couldn't PR and DAP sought the service of UMNO lawyers especially Shafee Abdullah? Afterall, UMNO has also openly declare that they too wanted to know the truth and what happened to BH Teoh;
   • why do Gobind, a lawyer, insisting on RCI to determine BH Teoh's death? The royal commission members has not been decided nor has the RCI approved by the YDP Agung, so couldn't all parties make do with the inquest first and upon completion, use the inquest as a tool to go for RCI, if that is the better option?
   • why is Gobind defending the 2 "unidentified" persons who refused to allow the police from taking DNA samples?
   • is Gobind laying booby traps along the inquest to put a cog to the wheel of justice?
   • is Gobind sincerely looking forward to solve the mysteries surrounding BH Teoh's death? If he is, then Gobind needs to set his prioities right, making sure the inquest can be conducted "incident free" from 5th August 2009 onwards.
     

5. The same goes to the Bar council. Why are they sending a team of 12 lawyers to hold a watching brief for the bar. Are Malaysians an incompetent lot? Will the 12 be present everyday during the inquest? Or they can come and go, when and if time permits? What happen if the bar rep is not present? Will the inquest continue or rest? Couldn't the bar council make do with a single lawyer or at most 3 lawyers to hold the watching brief?
   
6. And if you think that I am going to spare the AG's office, you are dead wrong. AG's office needs to address the following burning questions :-
   • why is the AG office using the service of a lawyer in private practise?
     
   • why didn't the AG's office sought the service of Shafee Abdullah?
     
   • is the AG office admitting that they do not have able and capable lawyers in their midst?
   • why didn't the AG office foresee the impact of direction number 1 of 2007?
   • why did the AG office work on commencing the inquest today when the police investigation papers are incomplete?
     
   • did the police brief the AG's office that they are still pursuing the leads on the unidentified DNAs' found on BH Teoh?
     

7. Despite all that, I see the Teohs' being politically manipulated. What the Teohs' family members want is to get to the bottom of the mystery on how BH Teoh died. If it is by natural cause - what is it? If it is through criminal acts - who are the persons involved? If it is by negligence - how to stop it from recurring?
8. When the Teohs' reportedly is adamant on the government to set up RCI, the first thing that runs through this mind is - Do the Teohs' know what is an RCI? It is easy to be manipulated and demabnding RCI but to understand the workings of RCI is not that easy. Even if an RCI is agreed, the composition of its members will be questioned. Or do the Teohs have someone in mind? What is the scope of the inquiry? What is the powers vested in them? Who will be the secretariat?
9. Honestly, I see PR and DAP in particular are using the Teohs' for their political ends. Parading them publicly in the many so called "memorial services" is pushing the masses sympathy to the limit. DAP image consultants should prepare the Teohs better by advising them on what to wear during the inquest. I see the Teohs' confused and angry expressions when they face the public. Why the confused look and are they angry with? I understand their losses but until the inquest gets to the bottom of things, the Teohs' will be better off if they could keep their anger under wraps. Getting angry is acceptable but it must be directed to the guilty party. For now, that guilty party is not identified.
   
10. Further, it is setting a dangerous precedent, questioning the integrity of public institutions. Granted, there are bad apples in public institutions but honest and dedicated workers numbers more than the bad apples. It is a matter of sorting them out and throwing the bad apples away for good bushels of well primed and excellent apples. It will be a truly sad day for Malaysia if we start by questioning the integrity and honesty of all public institution workers.
    
11. The inquest is moving slowly into a legal mess. If we allow the lawyers turn politicians to run the inquest, it will be another circus with each party trying to upstage the other along the way. Halway through, we might even lose the real intention and direction of the inquest, all because of political greed.
12. To that end, it is the scribe's hope and prayer that the inquest can proceed smoothly from 5th August 2009 onwards. I am sure the masses wants to know what happens on that fateful day BH Teoh lost his life. Most important, what are the lessons that we can learn from his tragic death. Maybe new procedures are needed. Maybe new guidelines are required. Maybe, we might even need a new revamp MACC...
13. We should not start or flame the blame game. Not towards MACC nor towards the police force. If we really need to start pointing fingers, then the first party that should be at fault are our politicians themselves and that includes bothall BN and PR parliamentarians who were in the august house when the formation of MACC was passed. Obviously, the bill or the act or whatever name use to refer to MACC is inadequate and done in haste to satisfy the political few.
14. Barely a year in existence, we see that MACC is still wanting and inadequate. There are still questions on the independence of MACC? The fairness of its commissioner is questionable. There are still claims of selective persecution and MACC has not been able to shake off its tag - that of a government watchdog pouncing on the opposition. The main thing is MACC has not been seen to be truly independent in its actions. Fullstop.
    
15. It begins with an inquest surrounding BH Teoh's demise, progressed to Gobind's successful request to adjourn the hearing...so basically in the end there is no quest, no new developments. Thus, we look forward to 5th August for the inquest to start rolling, hopefully leaving no stones unturned...to the satisfaction of the masses...
    

Till then...G'nite M'sia...wherever u are...