Conspirator, your name is Mahathir Mohamad

It would be euphemistic to call Anwar Ibrahim's ordeal a trial. It was a cynical political sham, writes Arthur Wyndham.

The guilty verdict this week in the sodomy trial of Malaysia's former deputy prime minister Anwar Ibrahim was condemned by world leaders, including John Howard, but none should have been surprised by it.

It was, as Anwar said, a political conspiracy to bring him down, conceived at the highest level of government, executed with the collusion of the police, the security services and the judiciary of the highest courts in the land.

The trial was not about sodomy. That was never proved, in spite of "confessions" implicating Anwar extracted after a week or two in the notorious Bukit Aman remand centre.

It was about political survival - the survival of the Prime Minister, Dr Mahathir Mohamad - and had its origins long before Anwar's dismissal and arrest in September 1988.

A rift between Dr Mahathir and Anwar over how to contain the devastating effects on Malaysia's economy of the 1997 Asian currency crisis, compounded by consistent speculation on a challenge to the leadership, made Anwar's sacking inevitable.

But his arrest on charges of sodomy stunned the nation, divided and politicised its people as never before, and brought huge protests to the streets.

Anwar's ordeal began with a letter sent to Dr Mahathir in August 1997 alleging that Anwar not only was a homosexual who had sodomised his driver, but had also committed adultery with the wife of his private secretary.

Special Branch officers who investigated the allegations at the time reported to Dr Mahathir that they could find no supporting evidence. At a news conference Dr Mahathir announced that the case was closed, and that Anwar had his full confidence and would succeed him as prime minister.

In turn, Anwar requested that Special Branch obtain written retractions from those who made the claims. It was on this action, understandable in the circumstances, that a year later the corruption and sodomy charges would be based.

The letter and its allegations were a time bomb, primed, filed and ready for future use. The fuse would be lit by one of Anwar's strongest supporters of a factional attempt to challenge Dr Mahathir's leadership.

He was Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, head of the influential youth division of the ruling party, UMNO.

At the late June 1998 UMNO general assembly Hamidi made a spirited attack on government cronyism and and nepotism. He spoke of "bailouts", no-collateral bank loans to debt-ridden companies with government connections, of lucrative contracts for national infrastructure projects given to to friends and relatives of those in power, and of other activities implying graft at high levels of government.

He was talking about corruption but did not give it a name. It was seen for what it clearly was: an attack on the leadership of Dr Mahathir, and as Hamidi acting as a surrogate for Anwar's leadership ambitions.

It was to backfire spectacularly, to destroy both Hamidi's and Anwar's political careers, and to trigger the most destructive period of UMNO's history. Hamidi, one observer said, was "a young bull who couldn't recognise a tiger". The tiger was his Prime Minister.

There followed a series of seemingly unrelated events. A month after Hamidi's attack on corruption an obscure provincial judge was transferred to the High Court as a judicial commissioner, a function below that of a judge.

A month later, on August 29, he was formally installed as a judge of the High Court. He was Augustin Paul, a Malaysian-born ethnic Indian.

Four days later, the Prime Minister's Department issued a brief statement to the effect that Datuk Seri Anwar bin Ibrahim had been removed from his posts of deputy prime minister and finance minister. No reason was given.

The next day, at a news conference, Dr Mahathir announced Anwar had been expelled from UMNO. When asked the reason, he replied: "We find him unsuitable, that's all. I do not have to give a reason as it is a party decision."

Most of the journalists at that news conference would have known the real reason for Anwar's sacking and expulsion: the perceived threat to Dr Mahathir's leadership.

Few would have expected the official reason for his arrest and the trials that followed: the affidavits filed in court the day after his sacking accusing him of sodomy and adultery.

At a news conference held at his home Anwar denied the allegations and said he was a victim of a high-level conspiracy.

He was arrested 18 days later, following huge street demonstrations against his sacking.

Arrested with him were 12 of his supporters. They included Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, now paying the price for his accusations of government corruption.

At a news conference Dr Mahathir said he had spoken to those who made the allegations and that "I am convinced of his [Anwar's] guilt".

Meanwhile, somewhere in the bowels of the halls of justice, Judge Paul, the newest and least experienced judge of the High Court, almost certainly was being briefed on the charges Anwar would face and the verdict he was expected to deliver.

Judge Paul had been appointed to the High Court's appellate and special powers division. The trial would come under the jurisdiction of the criminal division, in which a veteran judge was available to hear the case.

However, two days before Anwar's scheduled High Court appearance on October 5, Judge Paul was assigned to the trial.

It defies imagination to believe that his elevation as a High Court judge just a month before Anwar's arrest, and his assignment to the trial at short notice, was unconnected with what Anwar claimed to be a political conspiracy to bring him down.

In the two trials Anwar faced, the first for corruption and the second for sodomy, the collusion between judge and prosecution was starkly, and at times comically, revealed.

In both trials the judge allowed the prosecution to amend the charges mid-trial. In any independent judicial system the trials would have been aborted.

In the first trial Judge Paul accepted a prosecution request to amend the charges after farcical and failed attempts to prove Anwar's sexual misconduct. The trial proceeded on the basis that the prosecution need prove only that allegations of sexual misconduct were made.

The judge explained: "The onus of proof on the prosecution is the same whether the allegations are true or false. What requires proof is only the fact that the allegations were made. Consequently, proof that the allegations are false does not lend weight to the defence and is therefore irrelevant."

Before the corruption trial began, two others alleged to have been sodomised by Anwar were tried and sentenced to six months' jail. One was 51-year-old Pakistan-born Munawar Anees, his former speechwriter.

On his release from prison he retracted his guilty plea, which he said was forced by sustained police brainwashing and humiliation. He was again arrested and charged with perjury.

The other was Anwar's adopted brother, Indonesian-born Sukma Darmarwan. During his trial a defence medical expert gave evidence that he had never been sodomised. Nevertheless, he too was convicted and sentenced to six months' jail.

Several other Anwar supporters were arrested and charged with having been sodomised by Anwar. The only one who did not claim that his confession was made under duress was Azizan Abu Bakar, the man on whose allegations both trials were based. His immediate reward was to be appointed director of a company called Azariq Sdn.Bhd (limited company), with instructions to "turn the company around".

During the trial, when even the judge was prompted to remark that his evidence was "one thing today and another tomorrow", he was promoted to manager of a development company, with a car for his private use. It helped to give his evidence focus.

The corruption trial dragged on for 78 days before ending with Anwar's six-year jail sentence in April last year. The sodomy trial began in June, but would leave the 20th century behind and badger along for eight months of the 21st.

Facing the court were both Anwar and his adopted brother, on bail from his earlier conviction of having been sodomised by Anwar. This time Sukma was jointly charged with Anwar of having sodomised Azizan Abu Baka. Judge Arifin Jaka was the ringmaster.

In the early days of the trial the prosecution twice amended the charges. The second amendment made significant changes to the date of the alleged offence.

From "one night at 7.45 pm in May 1992" was amended to "one night at 7.45 pm between January and March 1993". Punctuality by the clock was observed, but the month and year were variables.

The defence had shown that the apartment building in which the offences allegedly occurred was still being built in May 1992.

The defence claim of mistrial was ruled out of order by Judge Arifin as expeditiously as had Judge Paul. What followed was such a bare-faced travesty of justice that even he must have been impressed.

On the 64th day of the trial Judge Arifin ordered the defence to make its final submission within three days, and rejected its application for time to prepare it.

To a stunned court he added: "After a maximum evaluation of all admissible evidence adduced by the prosecution I am satisfied that the prosecution has proven its case beyond reasonable doubt."

In any independent judicial system the trial would have been aborted. But this was Malaysia. The trial would continue for another 10 months in a judicial system corrupted and subservient to government interests since Dr Mahathir sacked the chief justice on trumped-up charges in 1988.

Both of Anwar's trials were snared in the incredible legal maze brought about by the malevolence with which Dr Mahathir pursued him and his supporters.

With the flurry of arrests and trials of so many others caught up in this web of conspiracy, they became a main event surrounded by sideshows.

In all of the trials and appeals, the decisions of the judiciary were in celestial harmony. Some might call it collusion. The rule of law does not apply in Malaysia. Mahathir is both the law and above the law.

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Arthur Wyndham is a freelance writer who lived and worked in Malaysia for several years.