THE TRIAL OF A PRESIDENT

As posted by Dr. Mahathir Mohamad at Che Det on June 08, 2012

1. I watched on Al Jazeera the trial of President Charles Taylor of Liberia. He was accused of war crimes.  He was found guilty and sentenced to 50 years jail.

2. He is 64 years old and 50 years really means a life sentence for him. The prosecution was disappointed as they had asked for 80 years. I suppose the prosecution expects him to be discharged at the end of 80 years when he would be 144 years old!  He must live to that age so he can suffer fully for his crimes.

3. There is no doubt that Taylor was guilty as charged. The prosecution told about how he was responsible for the killings in a neighbouring country.  On one occasion he did not stop a soldier from forcing a woman to carry a sack-full of decapitated heads. That was truly inhuman, more inhuman than the killings and the hideous injuries inflicted by another President on hundreds of thousands of Afghans, Iraqis and others, more inhuman than the tortures of prisoners in Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib and elsewhere.

4. Taylor had been captured in 2006.  He was there at the trial.

5. But leaders of powerful countries cannot be arrested and tried, not even when their war crimes are much worse.

6. The leaders of powerful countries have starved little new-born babies, deprived them of medicine, and exposed them to depleted uranium until half-a-million of them died in Iraq. As Madeline Albright said, it was worth it.

7. Leaders of powerful nations who had set up the International Criminal Court, who had formulated the laws governing wars, who had tried war criminals and sentenced them to death; leaders of powerful countries are privileged, are above the very laws they formulated. No! They are actually heroes and their pictures are put up in the Presidential Palace with proper ceremonies, so the nation would always remember them for their bravery in killing babies and potential terrorists.

8. And we are told to apply the rule of law in our countries if we want to be democrats like them.  If we don’t then we might be replaced through regime change or be arrested, tried and jailed for a hundred years. Truly we are living in a world devoted to fairness and justice, a world where full legal process would be instituted against us because we are weak. Only the weak will be punished; the strong will be celebrated as heroes for committing the same crimes.

9. Its like what our teachers told us long ago, “Do as I told you, but don’t do as I do.”

10. And the response to this would be that UMNO is much worse.

EQUALITY BEFORE THE LAW

As posted by Dr. Mahathir Mohamad at Che Det on June 04, 2012

1. One of the nonsense that we believe in is equality before the law. Of course this is one of the great fictions that democracy is said to uphold. But then democracy itself is often not even democratic. The people, the ordinary citizens never really govern themselves. But that is another story.

2. Now, about equality before the law that democracy is said to uphold. It is not upheld at all. Some people are actually above the law and some are far below it, i.e. they don’t really get the benefit or the protection of the law.

3. I will deal with those who do not benefit first. The democratic legal system gives the power to the courts to decide on disputes between individuals or organisations. The courts are presided over by legally qualified but very human judges. The contestants have to convince the presiding judge of their innocence.

4. Not being conversant with the laws the complainant and the defendant hire lawyers to argue their cases for them. Now some lawyers are clever and smart, but some may be just plain stupid. But both cost money. The smarter lawyers would naturally cost much more than the not-so-good ones.

5. Some lawyers have great reputations. In fact some may even be great politicians. Some of these political lawyers can be frightening to the judges.

6. The result of the inequality of representation by brilliant and fearsome lawyers on the one hand and the ordinary run-of-the-mill lawyers is most likely to be victory for the highly paid, brilliant and fearsome lawyers. The rights and wrongs of the case are of little consequence.

7. Effectively the law almost always favours the rich and not the poor. There is clearly no equality before the law. Get a good expensive lawyer and you can get away with murder. Get a bad cheap lawyer and you may be hanged for someone else’s murder.

8. International law is no better. If you lead a powerful country you can massacre a few millions and all that happens is a statue, as a war hero, will be put up in your honour.

9. If you lead a poor weak country and you act against violence by the opposition, then you may be accused of oppression and tolerating police brutality. The opposition, when they are clever enough to promise a variety of freedoms, can do no wrong even when they use violence to provoke the police into so-called acts of brutality.

10. If you are a favourite candidate of foreign powers for regime change, you can do what you like, and any Governmental action against you would be labelled as uncalled for oppression. If an election is near and the favourite is going to be a candidate and bring about regime change, then Government action against this privileged person would be regarded as attempts to undermine his chances of overthrowing the Government.

11. That the favourite purposely timed his violence just when elections are near would be ignored. That the provocation of the police is deliberate and meant to elicit “police brutality’” will also be ignored. That the police are beaten up, that police cars have their glass windshields smashed and the police car is overturned in full view of TV cameras – all these are inconsequential.

12. The main thing is the action against the favoured opposition by the Government will be deemed political rather than an exercise in legal equality by the Government.

13. The clamour is for the police to be charged for crimes against the people. Actions by the police to enforce the law must not be allowed. These must be regarded as criminal acts.

14. But blatant criminal acts by the opposition leaders must be regarded as permissible. In law they must be considered as privileged people.

15. There really is no equality before the law. Instead there is blatant inequality; there is bias in favour of some people especially the aspirants for regime change.