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• Lingam: Looks like me, sounds like me
• Lingam was not drunk, says witness
• It is not Ahmad Fairuz, says Lingam
• Video maker confirms recording clip
• Don't force us to take action, warns Haidar

KUALA LUMPUR: Day 6 of the Royal Commission of Inquiry Into the V.K. Lingam Video Clip started at 10.10 this morning.

Tan Sri Haidar started by informing Wee Choo Keong that he was advised that it was reported in The Star that he (Wee Choo Keong) had said that the Commission was reluctant to call his client as a witness. At this point, Datuk Shankar said that he heard it was reported that the Commission was making excuses for not calling his client.

Wee was asked whether he did in fact say this to the press. Wee responded that he could not remember because there were a lot of reporters outside the courtroom after the proceedings adjourned on Friday. Tan Sri Haidar advised Wee to be careful and hoped that there is some respect for the Commission and to not simply make insinuations. Wee confirmed that there was no such intention to disrespect the Commission.

M. Puravalen then renewed his application for Dato’ Seri Anwar Ibrahim to be called as a witness as soon as possible because he leaves for overseas on Wednesday. After some queries and submissions, Datuk Shankar said that if the Commission was being asked to call him as a witness immediately, the answer is no. He said there are other witnesses that ought to be called first and it would be apparent to counsel why this is so.

Loh Gwo Burne was then called to give evidence. To questions by Dato’ Nordin, the witness confirmed that Loh Mui Fah is his father. He confirmed that he knew Dato’ V.K. Lingam. He said he cannot recall the exact date but he remembers visiting Dato’ Lingam’s house in late December and the purpose of the visit was for dinner and to discuss legal matters. He confirmed that he did take a camera to Dato’ Lingam’s house. He said he brought the camera along because it was a new camera and he brought it around everywhere to use it. It was a Sony 707. He said Dato’ Lingam knew he had a camera and during the course of the night he did take photographs at the house.

When shown the photo of Dato’ Lingam, Manjit Singh and Mui Fah, the witness confirmed it was taken by him after dinner at about 10 pm. When shown the photo of Dato’ Lingam, his sister and Mui Fah, the witness confirmed it was taken by him before dinner at about 7 pm.

Gwo Burne also confirmed that his camera did have a video recording function. He confirmed he did record Dato’ Lingam speaking on the phone and he did record Dato’ Lingam speaking to his father after the phone call.

The video clip was played for the witness. The witness confirmed the contents were the same as what he recorded. When asked by Dato’ Nordin why he recorded the video clip, he said, “I was trying to take a picture of the vase and halfway through I discovered it was on video recording mode. I let the recording continue because he was bored and frankly I was fed up with Dato’ Lingam always on the phone”.

He said that Dato’ Lingam was supposed to be discussing legal matters with his father and him but Dato’ Lingam was always constantly on the phone and dealing with other matters.

The witness confirmed it was Dato’ Lingam in the video clip speaking on the phone. He said he did not believe that Dato’ Lingam was aware he was recording the video. He said he had heard what Dato’ Lingam say when he was on the phone. He confirmed that it was his father sitting on the sofa. He said he did not tell his father he was recording the video. He said that he did hear the conversation between his father and Dato’ Lingam. When asked why the photograph after dinner shows the man’s shirt was tucked in but it was not so in the video clip, the witness said that the video clip was taken before dinner and during dinner, Dato’ Lingam spilled some curry on his shirt and went to change. Presumably he tucked in his shirt after that.

The witness testified that he went home and on the same night he downloaded the contents of the memory card of the camera into his computer. A month later, he burned it into a CD. When asked the whereabouts of the CD, he said it has been a long time and he did not know where the CD was. He said that before he left for China, he downloaded the entire contents of his computer into various mediums, e.g. dvd, hard drive and into his laptop. He said in 2002 he burnt an extra CD for Manjit Singh. He said his original computer is not around anymore and the downloaded contents are in various places in China.

When asked how the video clip came to be released to the public, the witness said “Initially, I thought it was Manjit but then I found out he died, so I have no idea”.

To questions by his counsel, Alex de Silva, the witness said that he arrived at the house at around 6 pm and shortly after his arrival he asked Dato’ Lingam if he could take some photos and recordings and Dato’ Lingam said ok. He said Dato’ Lingam thereafter went out to buy some wine and came back after 30 minutes. He said Dato’ Lingam’s sister was there for about 30 – 45 minutes and that dinner was served at about 8.30pm. He said the video clip was taken after Dato’ Lingam’s sister had left but before dinner.

He said that he did not follow exactly the contents of the phone conversation and that he did not tell his father about the video recording. He said he gave the video recording to Manjit Singh around 2002 and that he did so because they both had complaints about Dato’ Lingam. Manjit’s complaint was that he had not been paid. The witness testified that Manjit said Dato’ Lingam was always “politics, politics, politics”. The witness asked Manjit to check out the video clip and he burnt a CD for him. He did not tell his father he gave the CD to Manjit.

The witness confirmed that in transferring the data from his camera to his computer, he did not interfere, tamper or edit the video clip. He confirmed that what had been played in the courtroom was the recording he had taken. When asked what was his impression that evening and whether Dato’ Lingam was drunk or intoxicated, Gwo Burne said “It was just early in the evening. We had not even had dinner yet. Throughout the night they didn’t drink that much anyway. I don’t think even by the end of the night he was drunk”. When asked whether it was his impression that Dato’ Lingam was play acting or staging, the witness said “No. Sometimes I could hear a male voice on the other side of the line”.

Then R Thayalan, counsel for Dato’ Lingam, posed questions. The witness confirmed that the photos and video were on the same memory card. He said he had deleted the photos and videos stored in the memory card. Counsel asked whether the witness agreed that the recordings taken of the house were not part of the video clip and that part of the video recording had been deleted from the video clip. When the witness did not understand, Tan Sri Haidar explained the question and the witness said that the video recording of the house was before the video clip shown in the courtroom. To a question by Datuk Shankar, the witness agreed that the memory card has other material apart from what has been seen here.

When asked by Thayalan whether he agreed that without the original memory card, the Commission could not compare the video clip with other materials in the memory card, the witness said that the materials are still available and whether or not he recorded the house is not relevant to the video clip recording. He did not agree that without the original memory card, it was not possible to compare. He said that the video clip was a separate file from other recordings in the memory card and it was not a continuous recording. When asked “Without the memory card, can we conclusively say that the video clip is only recordings in that file?”, the witness said yes. Datuk Shankar said “What you are saying is that this segment is complete in itself from start to finish and this is one complete segment?” The witness agreed.

When asked whether it is possible to have edited the video clip, the witness said it is not entirely impossible. Upon clarification from Tan Sri Haidar, the witness agreed that the video clip he saw today was the same as what he recorded.

The witness said that the camera was not hidden and was visible to Dato’ Lingam. He said it was either hanging from his neck by a strap or on his lap and was visible at all times.

Questions were then posed by counsel for Tun Ahmad Fairuz. The witness refused to agree that the video clip could not be verified without the original memory card. He said that when he downloaded a file to another medium, it is still identical.

Datuk Shankar posed a few questions. The witness said the memory card could hold 60 to 90 minutes of recording. He said he bought the camera 2 weeks before the visit.

To a question by Thayalan as to how the witness could tell it was a male voice on the other side of the line, the witness said “I think through experience I can tell”. The witness agreed that he did not know as a fact who Dato’ Lingam was talking to.

When questioned by counsel for Tun Ahmad Fairuz as to how far away Dato’ Lingam was from the witness, the witness said he was moving around, sometimes he was near him and sometimes he was far away. When asked whether his father was in a better position than he was to hear, the witness said he might have better hearing than his father.

That brought to an end the evidence of Gwo Burne.

Dato’ Lingam was then called as a witness. To questions by Dato’ Nordin, he confirmed that he knows Tan Sri Vincent Tan, Tengku Adnan and Mui Fah. He said that he had known Mui Fah since 1995 and that he used to come to his office 3 times a year. He said that Loh was never his client and he had not done any legal work for him. He did say that Loh’s father had been his client. He said he had never acted as Loh’s lawyer. He said he had seen the video clip – the ACA had shown it to him and he also watched it on the internet while he was overseas. The video clip was played again and the witness confirmed it was the same clip he had seen.

When asked whether he was the man speaking in the video clip, Dato’ Lingam said “It looks like me”. At this point, Dato’ Nordin explained to the witness the evidence already given by Mui Fah, Gwo Burne, Tengku Adnan, the expert voice analyst and Tun Eusoff Chin and asked the witness again whether it was him in the video clip.

The witness said that “Irrespective of what others have said, it looks like me and sounds like me.” But he continued that he had read literature and research that states that authenticity cannot be established without the original recording and when he had the original recording, he would send it to his consultants to verify its authenticity.

When asked who was he speaking to on the phone, the witness said “I do not know. But certainly I was not speaking to Tun Ahmad Fairuz because I have never had his phone number and he has never had my phone number. To date I have never spoken to Tun Ahmad Fairuz on the phone and he has never spoken to me on the phone”.

Proceedings to resume at 2 pm.

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