Acceptance speech delivered by Param Cumaraswamy in response to the citation contributed by Steven Thiru and David Dinesh Mathew, and
delivered by Cyrus Das
This item has been updated since initial publication.
Mr President, George Varughese; Dato’ Ramachelvam, Chairperson of the Malaysian Bar Lifetime Achievement Award Selection Committee; distinguished guests; and fellow Members of the Bar.
Thank you, Mr President and your colleagues in the Bar Council, for conferring this award on me this year. Having received awards in the past from international bodies, receiving this from the body of my own peers is heartening.
In early 1967 when I filed my petition for admission to the Bar here, there were just about 500 lawyers in practice. The Bar Council's Secretariat was at the law firm of the then Honorary Secretary of the Bar, Mr K A Menon, with one staff seated at a desk outside his room. She was Catherine Eu. Since then, today the Bar has grown to about 18,000 in number, with a Secretariat staff of about 100. What's more, the Bar Council has acquired its own building in the heart of Kuala Lumpur. The foresight and perseverance of the successive leaders of the Bar Council in recent years are highly commendable.
I could not have achieved what Dr Cyrus Das cited as my achievements, without the support and encouragement from my colleagues in the successive Bar Councils I served in various capacities in the 24 years. The Malaysian Bar’s commitment to the core values of an independent legal profession remains legendary.
In addition, the support from the international legal fraternity was a great encouragement and kept me going. The support and cooperation I received from international and national non–governmental organisations ("NGOs") were most encouraging. My close association with the International Commission of Jurists, the International Bar Association, LAWASIA, and several national bar associations, was a booster. They strengthened my resolve in the quest to pursue, promote and protect the rule of law and respect for human rights, the independence of the judiciary and the legal profession nationally and internationally.
The burden and stress of lawyers who struggle for the ideals of an independent profession at national levels would be lessened if it is known and their efforts are supported by international and other national associations of lawyers. That was clearly seen and demonstrated at my trial for sedition in 1985. The presence at the trial of eminent counsel either holding watching brief or as observers for various international and national bar associations clearly demonstrated to the Malaysian public the solidarity of lawyers all over the world to uphold the cause of justice and the independence of the legal profession. In fact, the then–Chairman of the English Bar, Robert Alexander QC, called me and offered his services pro bono to be part of my defence team. I thanked him for his offer but declined, as there would have been some difficulties in getting his admission to appear in our courts. I was happy with my defence team led by YM Raja Aziz Addruse, with Dr Cyrus Das, Porres Royan and Darryl Goon. Their eminence and integrity were beyond question.
The importance of such support from the international legal fraternity was seen later during the 1988 judicial crisis in defence of the six valiant judges who were unceremoniously suspended / removed.
I also received support from my colleagues in Shook Lin & Bok then. When I was a legal assistant in the firm, Mr Yong Pung How, the senior partner then, who later became the Chief Justice of Singapore, on reading my press statements critical of the government cautioned me and said that Malaysia was not cut out for martyrs!
The support from my loving family — my wife Davinder whose late sister Kalvinder was a Member of the Bar, my daughters Shanthi and Deborah, and my son Shankar, their mother Rosy, my sons–in–law David and Marty, and my grandsons Liam and Alessandro — was solid. I am grateful to my parents, and for the support of my sisters and brothers, nieces and nephews.
A robust and sound administration of justice in a State is dependent on a tripartite co–operation among an independent judiciary, the office of the public prosecutor, and an independent legal profession. When the fundamentals of the independent judiciary and the office of the public prosecutor are tampered with by the executive arm of the government, the legal profession stands alone to alert the public and seek restoration of the fundamentals. In the process, the profession must brace itself for retaliation to the fundamentals of its own independence, namely qualifications to practise, self–regulation and self–discipline. In that event, public trust in the justice system will remain undermined until the fundamentals are restored. The profession must remain steadfast and united in defence of its independence.
At the height of the judicial crisis in 1988, Tun Suffian said that it would take a generation to restore the judicial independence which we then had.
I was on the UN mandate on the Independence of Judges and Lawyers for nine years. I intervened with governments, big or small, in writing and undertook missions to several countries across the globe. That gave me an insight into the various forms of injustices in societies and assaults on judicial and lawyers’ independence.
The worst form of injustice in any civilised society is the injustice perpetrated through the judicial process at the behest of the executive arm of the government. One striking case I was drawn into was the case of the late Benazir Bhutto.
In 1999, Benazir was tried in absentia, convicted and sentenced to five years' imprisonment for corruption, by Justice Qayyum at the High Court in Rawalpindi.
Sometime in late February 2001, I was delivered a tape recording with a transcript at my Kuala Lumpur office. It was delivered by a messenger from the office of Benazir who was then residing in Dubai. The content of the tape recording was a telephone conversation between Justice Qayyum and a high–ranking official at ministerial level in Pakistan exerting pressure on the judge to convict and sentence Benazir. Muhammad Nawaz Sharif was then the Prime Minister. The conversation was recorded by a staff of the intelligence sub–bureau in Lahore. It was in Urdu. There was a translation in English.
After verifying the authenticity of the recording and the transcript on March 26, 2001, I sent an urgent appeal in writing to the Government of Pakistan, and personally met its Permanent Representative in Geneva and expressed grave concern over the revelation in the tape recording. The trial was clearly flawed. On April 5, I raised the issue before the 52 State Member Commission in Geneva at its 57th annual session. This revelation stunned the state delegates at that Session. I had in my hand the tape recording.
Benazir’s appeal over her conviction and sentence was then pending before the Supreme Court. Just about two weeks after the revelation of the content of the tape recording before the Commission, the Supreme Court heard the appeal and set aside the conviction and sentence and ordered a fresh trial.
Sometime in early May 2001, I received communication from Benazir's secretary that she wanted to call on me personally in Kuala Lumpur to express her gratitude. I said it was not necessary for her to take all that trouble but, on her insistence, we arranged to meet at the Petaling Jaya Hilton for lunch at the Chinese restaurant on May 7, 2001.
My wife Davinder and I received her and her secretary at the entrance. She appeared very graceful with a stunning personality. At lunch over about two hours, she recounted her political life and the problems and future for democracy in Pakistan. On the judiciary, she said, “Mr Cumaraswamy, it is only when one is in the Opposition that one appreciates the value of judicial independence.”
After lunch I drove her back to KL International Airport ("KLIA"), where she took a flight to Singapore en route to Dubai.
I realise this is a social evening, our Annual Dinner & Dance, not a human rights conference. I'm sure all of you are eagerly waiting to listen to Harith Iskander and Vijay David.
On that note, once again Mr President and members of the Bar Council, thank you for this honour you have bestowed on me. Continue your noble pursuit for justice through a just rule of law.
March 17, 2018
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Please click:
(1) here to view the citation for Param Cumaraswamy;
(2) here to view a video on Param Cumaraswamy; and
(3) here for a peek at the highlights of the Malaysian Bar’s Annual Dinner and Dance 2018, held at the Grand Ballroom of the Mandarin Oriental Hotel, Kuala Lumpur, on 17 Mar 2018.