34 Years After Ops Lalang Still No Sincere Apology By Dr M

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From Kua Kia Soong
Operation Lalang was Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s worst abuse of power during his 23-year rule when he arrested and detained more than a hundred innocent Malaysians without trial under the infamous Internal Security Act (ISA) in 1987.
It happened to be his most desperate attempt at clinging to power.
It was a time during his term when he was faced with the biggest threat to his rule, with Team B under Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah challenging the results of the Umno elections. A court decision in Team B’s favour would have meant the end of Mahathir’s grasp on power.
In the run-up to Ops Lalang and before the assault on the judiciary resulting in the sacking of the Lord President and several other Supreme Court judges, the ruling party had orchestrated a tense situation in the country by creating various “sensitive” issues involving the sending of non-Mandarin qualified administrators to the Chinese schools, conversion of Muslims to Christianity, and even threatening to organise a 500,000-people Umno rally in the capital.
All this was to justify unleashing Ops Lalang to deal with the so-called “threats to national security” identified by the state.
Mahathir started the rot in Malaysian institutions
This is what the Ops Lalang detainees (including myself, Karpal Singh, Lim Kit Siang, Lim Guan Eng, Mohamad Sabu and Nasir Hashim) said in our declaration on the first anniversary of our detention:
“The year since this dastardly ‘Operation Lalang’ has been an outrage for all freedom-loving and democratic-minded Malaysians. The Mahathir administration has made even more brutal attacks on the democratic institutions in this country. The doctrine of separation of powers has been dealt a serious blow by the threats to the Judiciary not only through legislative changes but also by the scandalous suspension of five Supreme Court judges as well as the Lord President. The subsequent dismissal of the Lord President and two of the judges demonstrated the depths to which the Mahathir administration is prepared to go to stay in power. Civil liberties have been further eroded by new changes to the law. It is quite clear, therefore, that this so-called ‘Operation Lalang’ was a signal for calculated repression and intimidation of the Malaysian people and to divert attention from the irresolvable problems confronting the ruling party and coalition.”
Several of these ex-detainees/politicians were rewarded with ministerships by Mahathir when he became prime minister again in the Pakatan Harapan government of 2018-20. Whether they are prepared to repeat what they declared in 1988 or not ultimately depends on their individual integrity.
They were certainly not physically tortured like some other detainees. This does not detract from the fact that Ops Lalang was a dastardly act by Mahathir which wantonly destroyed any neutrality of the justice system that had operated within the country since Independence.
According to former leader of the opposition Kit Siang, “it was during Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s 22-year tenure as prime minister when Malaysia first began to ‘rot’, thanks to corruption and rampant power abuse. He single-handedly destroyed the independence, impartiality and professionalism not only of the judiciary, but also of other important national institutions like the police, the Election Commission, the anti-corruption agency and the civil service.”
Mahathir created a police state
Tunku Abdul Rahman, Malaysia’s first prime minister, characterised Ops Lalang as the creation of a police state, a very serious precedent that led to more such arrests and detentions without trial in the years that followed:
“It’s a police state when you can go and arrest people at will without giving any reason other than they think they are a security risk … I do not concede Dr Mahathir’s contention that his measures are predicated solely on the extreme tension between Malays and Chinese last month which brought the country close to serious racial rioting. It’s not a question of Chinese against the government but his own party, Umno, who are against him”.
Mahathir signed the detention orders
Since his first retirement as prime minister, Mahathir has been trying in vain to claim that Ops Lalang was not his doing but that of the police. This attempt at whitewashing his record on this dark episode in recent Malaysian history is futile.
In his haste to pull the wool over the eyes of those who may not remember Ops Lalang by blaming it on the police, Mahathir has overlooked the fundamental fact that the implementation of the ISA depends on the signature of the home minister (that is Mahathir at the time).
Thus, it was Mahathir as home minister who was required, by law, to sign the two-year detention order issued after the first 60 days of solitary confinement. When he signed those two-year detention orders near the end of 1987, he would no doubt have been aware of a stark fact – all those he further detained were opposition leaders and other dissidents while all the BN detainees had been conveniently released during the 60 days! The IGP had no authority to sign those detention orders- only Mahathir, as home minister, had that authority.
Mahathir must take responsibility for all who were physically tortured
Mahathir must also take responsibility for all the allegations of torture made by Ops Lalang victims. If the former IGP is foolhardy enough to claim responsibility for Ops Lalang, then he must also answer to all these allegations of torture during the operation as well. He is certainly culpable in the torture of detainees.
The International Red Cross, who interviewed us at Kamunting, said the 60 days of solitary confinement were already a gross example of mental torture. Yeshua Jamaluddin, Nasir Hashim, Chow Chee Keong and Irene Xavier, among others, have graphically described also being physically tortured by the Special Branch while under solitary confinement during the first 60 days.
This is Yeshua Jamaluddin’s affidavit at his habeas corpus hearing in October 1988:
“On one occasion, I was knocked to the ground and I injured my back. Since then, I have been passing blood in my urine and have been suffering from pains in my lower back constantly. In March 1988 and in July 1988, I was admitted to the University Hospital, Kuala Lumpur, for treatment of my kidney condition. I have still not recovered. On another occasion during interrogation, Inspector Yusoff forced me to strip naked and to enact the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. He also forced me to crawl on the floor in a naked state… then a police constable forced me to stand on one leg with both my arms outstretched holding my slippers. He made me remain in this position for two hours. He then called in a woman constable and her young daughter and asked them to look at me saying, ‘This Malay is not aware of who he is. He changed his religion. He has no shame’.”
Torture under the ISA had been perpetrated with impunity by the Special Branch since it was enacted in 1960. Unfortunately for Mahathir, the principle of ministerial responsibility means that as the home minister and prime minister at the time, he is ultimately responsible for Ops Lalang and all the atrocities committed under this dragnet.
A sincere apology is the test of a born-again democrat
An apology on this occasion is an act of declaring one’s regret, remorse and sorrow for having inflicted pain and suffering on victims of Ops Lalang, the top-ranked judges of the judiciary and assaulting other democratic institutions in Malaysia.
In human rights, democracy and justice, miscreant autocrats and kleptocrats cannot get away with impunity. Impunity means “exemption from punishment or loss or escape from fines”. It refers to the failure to bring perpetrators of human rights violations, rule of law flouters and the corrupt to justice and constitutes a denial of the victims’ right to justice and redress.
On this 34th anniversary of the dastardly Ops Lalang, we call upon both coalitions to:
Put an end to detention without trial which still exists in the new laws Sosma, Poca and Pota;Call for a public apology and a sincere expression of remorse from the former prime minister, Dr Mahathir Mohamad, for depriving so many innocent Malaysians of their freedom and the torture they went through under Ops Lalang;Demand a thorough investigation into all allegations of torture under the ISA and other laws and for the torturers to be held accountable for their actions; andRatify the UN Convention Against Torture as soon as possible. - FMT
Kua Kia Soong is a former Ops Lalang detainee.
The views expressed are those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect those of MMKtT.

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