Posted by Dr. Mahathir Mohamad at www.chedet.com on July 1, 2008 6:21 PM
When the Honourable the de facto Minister of Justice said that if I had "proof of (Justice Ian) Chin's alleged misconduct and report the matter to the police or the Chief Justice" it became clear that the honourable and learned de facto Minister had not bothered to study the matter concerned. He was happy to comment and dismiss a complaint against the judge based on what he read (incorrectly) in the Press.
The report to the police had already been made by the people aggrieved by (Justice Ian) Chin's biased judgement and it had been extended to the Chief Justice, the former Minister in the Prime Minister's Department and to the Prime Minister himself. Receiving no response the complainants had extended it to the Human Rights Commission (Suhakam) as well. It is this report that the Government or its agencies should take action on. It details clearly the unethical behaviour of Chin.
I heard about the report from a relative of the people who made the charge after Chin made his "explosive revelation". The complete set of the report and related papers were sent to me. I also received the same report from lawyers involved in the case after Chin's revelation.
I mentioned the police report without elaborating on it in my rebuttal because I needed time to study it.
In his statement from the safety of his court on June 24th, 2008 Chin said, "Dr Mahathir by waving the supposed police report the way he did lent support to the generally held view that this Prime Minister kept a docket on everyone useful but with a skeleton in their cupboard so that he can manipulate them on pain of disclosing the skeleton. I thought only the STASI of the then Communist East Germany do such a thing but then it was done for the benefit of the State not for an individual. In my view he is trying to exploit the general believe to wave that supposed police report to get the public to believe that I have committed something unlawful which he is privy to and which the public is not unaware (?) so that my integrity could be put under suspicion to make what I have revealed unbelievable. Let me declare to the public that I am as clean as a whistle and my life is an open book". (From notes of Proceedings - Special Mention of Case June 24th, 2008)
In the same notes he stated "I have prepared in advance what I have to say today and had mailed copies of the same to the lawyers of the parties before today in case I meet with an accidental death and both counsels have agreed in the event of that happening, the statement I had sent them would be regarded as having been pronounced in court".
It sounds very much that Chin was afraid of being killed (by accident). Readers can make their own interpretation of what he implied. His statement would be his final word on the matter (before he dies).
Yet in the court of June 24th he said (vide proceedings of court) "I have since amended certain parts of that statement and counsel should delete the copy I had sent them and the one that counts is the one appearing in the following pages".
It is obvious that he did not think carefully about what he wanted to say and found it necessary to amend a statement which the court would have accepted as his final statement to the court had he accidentally died. Can such a sloppy judge be believed?
Be that as it may we must accept that the following record of proceedings on June 24th on his statement truly record what he said in court as different from his written statement to the counsels.
The most significant element in his statement of June 9th 2008 in open court is that regarding my alleged threat against judges.
Whereas that statement the record stated, "The then Prime Minister went there (to the Judges Conference) to issue a thinly veiled threat to remove judges by referring to the tribunal that was set up before and stating that though it may be difficult to do so it was still done", yet in his statement on June 24th he said (as recorded in the proceedings of June 15th);
"Now to the matter of the veiled threat. Dr Mahathir did not say that he will remove judges by referring to tribunal in those express words. You must know what went on before to appreciate what message he was attempting to convey in his devious way and to look at the subsequent events to put what he had said in the right perspective." This sentence again displays Chin's failure to find the words to prove that there was a threat. He finally resorted to saying that the Prime Minister uttered the veiled threat by "dropping words to that effect here and there". What words which "when dropped here and there" becomes a veiled threat?
He was so positive about the veiled threat on June 9th but on June 24th he seems to be unable to find words to show that there was a "veiled threat". Can people trust a judge who makes assumptions based on "words here and there"?
Surely if I made a veiled threat, other judges must have heard it and as one former judge said, "he would be shocked and would remember it". But no one else seems to remember it. Chin ranted against the judge who denied there was a threat, claiming he knows who the judge was and abusing him. Again he makes conclusion based on suspicion.
Accusing me of having a docket on everyone so that I can manipulate them is fantasy of the highest order. Certainly I did not have a docket on him. What I got was given to me after his statement on June 9, 2008.
He has the Government and the Honourable the de facto Minister of Justice on his side. They should be able to prove that I had this "docket" or that I had used police report to threaten anyone. Show me one case.
In the case of Anwar, the police reported to me about his bad morals and after consulting my colleagues and the UMNO Supreme Council, I took action to remove him. I did not keep these reports in order to threaten him.
Now of course he has another police report and it would be interesting to see how Chin's friends in the Government will deal with it.
In any case Chin should be happy that the Honourable the de facto Minister of Justice has decided (not the Attorney General whose job it is to examine the case) not to set up a tribunal or to do anything.
Chin appears to be unsparing in bad-mouthing other people from the safety of his court. He called me a "devil incarnate" and suggested that I behave like the East German Secret Police (STASI).
I wonder what the legal profession thinks about judges calling people names in their courts, people who are not even connected with the case being heard, and certainly people who had never been given a chance to be heard.
If this is the new standard then what people say about the deterioration of the judiciary must be true.
I have no intention to make any police report on the misbehaviour of Judge Ian Chin. It would be an exercise in futility under present conditions.
I leave it to the public to judge. If anyone had had a police report waved in his face during the 22 years I was Prime Minister, please make a police report.
If the police have evidence of a docket which I kept, please show evidence of this.
I pity the people who have to be tried by Chin. His fertile mind can conjure evidence where there is none, and he can pass sentence based on this. It is Chin's Justice.
When the Honourable the de facto Minister of Justice said that if I had "proof of (Justice Ian) Chin's alleged misconduct and report the matter to the police or the Chief Justice" it became clear that the honourable and learned de facto Minister had not bothered to study the matter concerned. He was happy to comment and dismiss a complaint against the judge based on what he read (incorrectly) in the Press.
The report to the police had already been made by the people aggrieved by (Justice Ian) Chin's biased judgement and it had been extended to the Chief Justice, the former Minister in the Prime Minister's Department and to the Prime Minister himself. Receiving no response the complainants had extended it to the Human Rights Commission (Suhakam) as well. It is this report that the Government or its agencies should take action on. It details clearly the unethical behaviour of Chin.
I heard about the report from a relative of the people who made the charge after Chin made his "explosive revelation". The complete set of the report and related papers were sent to me. I also received the same report from lawyers involved in the case after Chin's revelation.
I mentioned the police report without elaborating on it in my rebuttal because I needed time to study it.
In his statement from the safety of his court on June 24th, 2008 Chin said, "Dr Mahathir by waving the supposed police report the way he did lent support to the generally held view that this Prime Minister kept a docket on everyone useful but with a skeleton in their cupboard so that he can manipulate them on pain of disclosing the skeleton. I thought only the STASI of the then Communist East Germany do such a thing but then it was done for the benefit of the State not for an individual. In my view he is trying to exploit the general believe to wave that supposed police report to get the public to believe that I have committed something unlawful which he is privy to and which the public is not unaware (?) so that my integrity could be put under suspicion to make what I have revealed unbelievable. Let me declare to the public that I am as clean as a whistle and my life is an open book". (From notes of Proceedings - Special Mention of Case June 24th, 2008)
In the same notes he stated "I have prepared in advance what I have to say today and had mailed copies of the same to the lawyers of the parties before today in case I meet with an accidental death and both counsels have agreed in the event of that happening, the statement I had sent them would be regarded as having been pronounced in court".
It sounds very much that Chin was afraid of being killed (by accident). Readers can make their own interpretation of what he implied. His statement would be his final word on the matter (before he dies).
Yet in the court of June 24th he said (vide proceedings of court) "I have since amended certain parts of that statement and counsel should delete the copy I had sent them and the one that counts is the one appearing in the following pages".
It is obvious that he did not think carefully about what he wanted to say and found it necessary to amend a statement which the court would have accepted as his final statement to the court had he accidentally died. Can such a sloppy judge be believed?
Be that as it may we must accept that the following record of proceedings on June 24th on his statement truly record what he said in court as different from his written statement to the counsels.
The most significant element in his statement of June 9th 2008 in open court is that regarding my alleged threat against judges.
Whereas that statement the record stated, "The then Prime Minister went there (to the Judges Conference) to issue a thinly veiled threat to remove judges by referring to the tribunal that was set up before and stating that though it may be difficult to do so it was still done", yet in his statement on June 24th he said (as recorded in the proceedings of June 15th);
"Now to the matter of the veiled threat. Dr Mahathir did not say that he will remove judges by referring to tribunal in those express words. You must know what went on before to appreciate what message he was attempting to convey in his devious way and to look at the subsequent events to put what he had said in the right perspective." This sentence again displays Chin's failure to find the words to prove that there was a threat. He finally resorted to saying that the Prime Minister uttered the veiled threat by "dropping words to that effect here and there". What words which "when dropped here and there" becomes a veiled threat?
He was so positive about the veiled threat on June 9th but on June 24th he seems to be unable to find words to show that there was a "veiled threat". Can people trust a judge who makes assumptions based on "words here and there"?
Surely if I made a veiled threat, other judges must have heard it and as one former judge said, "he would be shocked and would remember it". But no one else seems to remember it. Chin ranted against the judge who denied there was a threat, claiming he knows who the judge was and abusing him. Again he makes conclusion based on suspicion.
Accusing me of having a docket on everyone so that I can manipulate them is fantasy of the highest order. Certainly I did not have a docket on him. What I got was given to me after his statement on June 9, 2008.
He has the Government and the Honourable the de facto Minister of Justice on his side. They should be able to prove that I had this "docket" or that I had used police report to threaten anyone. Show me one case.
In the case of Anwar, the police reported to me about his bad morals and after consulting my colleagues and the UMNO Supreme Council, I took action to remove him. I did not keep these reports in order to threaten him.
Now of course he has another police report and it would be interesting to see how Chin's friends in the Government will deal with it.
In any case Chin should be happy that the Honourable the de facto Minister of Justice has decided (not the Attorney General whose job it is to examine the case) not to set up a tribunal or to do anything.
Chin appears to be unsparing in bad-mouthing other people from the safety of his court. He called me a "devil incarnate" and suggested that I behave like the East German Secret Police (STASI).
I wonder what the legal profession thinks about judges calling people names in their courts, people who are not even connected with the case being heard, and certainly people who had never been given a chance to be heard.
If this is the new standard then what people say about the deterioration of the judiciary must be true.
I have no intention to make any police report on the misbehaviour of Judge Ian Chin. It would be an exercise in futility under present conditions.
I leave it to the public to judge. If anyone had had a police report waved in his face during the 22 years I was Prime Minister, please make a police report.
If the police have evidence of a docket which I kept, please show evidence of this.
I pity the people who have to be tried by Chin. His fertile mind can conjure evidence where there is none, and he can pass sentence based on this. It is Chin's Justice.
