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Minister's Nazri's response raises more questions - why can't the Chief Justice defend his own integrity himself/?

Why is Datuk Seri Nazri Aziz answering questions on the video scandal on behalf of the Chief Justice of Malaysia?

First , it is strange and irregular that the Chief Justice would ask a Minister to defend his integrity on his behalf. Minister Nazri Aziz also does not say when he was purportedly asked by the Chief Justice to make this reply.

Second, the content of the response is also strange and lacks credibility when the only and recent response the Chief Justice made directly to the public, without any assistance from the Minister, was to say in writing "I have no comment", two full days after the disclosure ( see letter at Malaysiakini 21st September ).

It is highly inappropriate for a member of the Executive - a Minister in the PM's Department no less - to be speaking for the highest ranking officer in the Judiciary. This makes a farce of the fundamental principle of the separation of powers. Now this strange response from Minister Nazri raises the question : is Tun Ahmad Fairuz not capable of speaking up for his own integrity?

Minister Nazri is also trying to raise the question of authenticity of the video – a competent forensic team should be able to establish that very easily.

The question now appears to be - did the Chief Justice speak to VK Lingam in 2002 prior to August ( based on the content of the conversation, the reference to making Tan Sri Moktar Abdullah the next Chief Judge Malaya ( CJM ) shows that the conversation would have taken place before Tan Sri Mokhtar Abdullah had a fall and went into a coma in August 2002 ) ? Again, this is not difficult to establish – we get their phone numbers and check their phone records for that year to see if they spoke to each other. Perhaps the Minister could pass this advice on to the relevant investigating authorities.

The integrity of our judiciary, one of the three key pillars of government, is at stake; these questions must be answered now.

Nazri also asks why Parti Keadilan Rakyat went to the media instead of confining it to the police and ACA. For us, the matters disclosed in the video were of immense public interest. The video also affirmed information known for years about such allegations of "judge fixing". Further, Minister Nazri must know that confidence in the police and ACA is at an all-time low. Full public scrutiny is therefore necessary not just for the police and ACA, but also the Prime Minister and all other concerned authorities to act effectively on this. For the record, Keadilan is also taking this up with the Conference of Rulers and the PM himself.

Finally, we note that at least two mainstream papers the NST and the Sun published Minister Nazri's response prominently on their front pages. However one would have expected discerning journalists to have also informed the public about the earlier written response of the Chief Justice. Their headlines also gave the somewhat misleading impression to the reader that it is the Chief Justice who is responding instead of Minister Nazri. We did not receive any calls to respond to the Minister's statement and hope that the media will act fairly and print this Keadilan response in full.

Sivarasa Rasiah
Vice President, Parti Keadilan Rakyat

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