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Wednesday, 02-Jun-2004 9:59 AM Dead men tell no tales Dead men tell no tales; so the old saying goes. But if you cannot kill them, as unfortunately present day laws do not provide for this unless you are killed ‘resisting arrest’, then you can at least lock them up and throw away the keys. And this is exactly what has happened to a Sri Lankan businessman by the name of B.S.A. Tahir. Now hold on, who is this, before this, unknown B.S.A Tahir? And what exactly has he done? And where, in heaven’s name, is he being locked away? And, pray tell, what has he been charged with? For the benefit of those who read the newspapers for the sole purpose of following the latest sex-murder scandals and do not bother to read anything else, B.S.A Tahir is the business partner of the current Prime Minister’s son, Kamaluddin. His crime is exporting centrifuge parts to certain countries designated as not so good friends of the U.S. of A. And he has been locked away in the Kamunting Detention Center. He has not been charged or indicted for any crime though. And to enable them to lock him away in Kamunting without charging him for anything, they have detained him under the Internal Security Act (ISA), a ‘preventive’ law. Does this now all make sense to you? If it does, then I will be very surprised, because it does not make any sense to me. And let me explain why. The ISA was introduced in 1960 as a weapon to combat the Communist insurgency raging in Malaysia then, a period known as ‘the Emergency’. When Tun Abdul Razak, the then Deputy Prime Minister, tabled the proposed law in Parliament, the opposition questioned him on the purpose of this draconian law -- arrest and detention without trial. Tun Razak explained that this new law was specifically for use against the Communist Terrorists that numbered in the hundreds, 700 to 800, in particular operating in the Pahang jungles and along the Thai-Malaysian border. It would be used against the Communist Terrorists and only the Communist Terrorists, Tun Razak assured Parliament, and specifically to combat the insurgency that was raging out of control. And, with that, the ISA was passed into law with the support of even the opposition Members of Parliament. Well, the Communist insurgency has now ended. The Malayan Communist Party has signed a Peace Treaty with Malaysia and has since disbanded. And the Emergency has also officially ended. But the ISA remains. And it is no longer used against the Communist Terrorists or to combat the insurgency. It is now used against those who oppose the government, plus those the government would like to keep behind bars but would like to avoid the embarrassment of a trial in an open court where everything will come out and the shit may hit the fan. And which category is B.S.A Tahir in? Why, the category of those the government would like to lock away without the bother of a trial in an open court where everything will come out and the shit will hit the fan of course. B.S.A Tahir has been detained under the ISA because, as alleged by the Prime Minister, he is a ‘threat to national security’. We take it this means Malaysia’s national security. In what way is he a threat to Malaysia’s security? He did not do anything wrong in Malaysia. He was just a middleman or agent in the business of exporting centrifuge items. The centrifuges he exported were sent to other countries, not for use in Malaysia. If at all he is a threat to national security, then he is a threat to the security of the nation he exported those centrifuges to, if centrifuges can be classified as lethal weapons or weapons of mass destruction in the first place. Even if it is true that those centrifuges can be used in a nuclear arms manufacturing program and therefore can be classified as dangerous items, in what way is Malaysia’s security being threatened? These nuclear weapons were not being manufactured in Malaysia and neither were they intended for use against Malaysia. So Malaysia’s security is in no way threatened. And since the ISA is meant to protect Malaysia’s security and not the security of another nation, how can B.S.A. Tahir be detained under this law that is meant specifically to protect Malaysia’s security. Now, B.S.A Tahir is just a middleman. He merely exported the offending items. He is just a salesman. He did not manufacture them. Why then has the manufacturer not also been taken to task? The manufacturer is more dangerous than the salesman. And, according to the law, ignorance is no defence if this is what the manufacturer is pleading. You cannot plead innocence on grounds you were not aware or was ignorant that a crime was being committed. The law does not provide for this. A couple of months ago, the police investigated the manufacturer, SCOMI, a company owned by the Prime Minister’s son. The police investigation proved that no crime has been committed and SCOMI was given a clean bill of health. If no crime has been committed, how can the middleman, the exporter, the salesman, then have committed a crime? And why was B.S.A Tahir detained many months later and not when the crisis first erupted or as soon as the police investigation had been concluded? Does this mean a new investigation was launched and now new evidence reveals he is indeed guilty whereas many months ago this was not known? This does not appear to be the case here. If drugs are considered illegal, then both the manufacturer of the drugs plus the seller would have committed a crime. How come only the seller and not the manufacturer has committed a crime? Say computers are exported and these computers are used for an illegal activity, then the computer manufacturer and the salesman cannot be held accountable for the misuse of the computers. If not IBM would have been closed down by now. Computers, in itself, is not criminal, even if these computers are eventually used for something criminal. Something is terribly wrong here. There is certainly more than meets the eye. If the Malaysian government has enough evidence to detain B.S.A Tahir under the ISA, then surely there is enough evidence to indict him and put him on trial. Is maybe the real reason they detained him under the ISA was to silence this Sri Lankan businessman and make sure he does not reveal the truth? If indeed those centrifuge items are dangerous, could it be possible the company that manufactured them, SCOMI, which is owned by the Prime Minister’s son, knew what they were going to be used for and where they were headed for? And would all this then come out in a trial in an open court if B.S.A. Tahir was indicted and put on trial? Using the ISA to silence certain people so as to protect the real brains behind the evil deed is not a new tactic. When the opposition PBS headed by Pairin Kitingan was ruling Sabah, the ruling party, Barisan Nasional, ‘imported’ Muslim voters from Mindano in the Philippines in an effort to dilute the Christian voter majority that Pairin commanded. The imported voters were immediately given Malaysian citizenship through the issuance of identity cards by the National Registration Department (JPN), which comes under the federal government. Soon after the elections, after Pairin’s government had been toppled, many of the JPN officers involved in issuing these identity cards were arrested and detained under the ISA. And what was their alleged crime? Issuing ‘forged identity cards’. There is no such thing as a ‘forged identity card’, unless you made it yourself at home. These identity cards numbered in the tens of thousands and were officially or legally issued by the JPN in Sabah. The only thing is, they were issued to those not eligible to own them, non-Malaysians, Muslims from Mindano. So why were the JPN officers arrested and detained under the ISA? Stupid question! To keep them from revealing what they had done in the effort to topple Pairin’s ‘Christian’ government of course. Yes, dead mean tell no tales. So do those detained under the ISA and locked away in the safety of the Kamunting Detention Centre. Incidentally, since we are on the subject of how they managed to topple the opposition in Sabah, do you know that about 80,000 voters were created in the same manner in each of the states of Kelantan and Terengganu? Indonesian and Bangladeshi workers were suddenly turned into ‘Malaysians’ -- and since there are an estimated one to two million of them, finding 160,000 is not a problem. Now do you understand why the voter turnout in Kelantan and Terengganu was a new world record, in some constituencies exceeding 100% (which no other country in the world can duplicate), and how the ruling party managed to grab Terengganu and reduce Kelantan into a checkmate situation? Hmm, I wonder whether any JPN officers are now going to face detention under the ISA?
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