Who is ANWAR IBRAHIM - the Malaysian Hero

Paperback: 233 pages
Publisher: Malayan Law Journal Sdn. Bhd (1999)
Language: English

Read review here The Anwar Ibrahim judgment

KUALA LUMPUR - Malaysia's Anwar Ibrahim rejoined parliament on Thursday and was appointed leader of the opposition, taking another step towards his goal of winning power and reforming the economy.

Anwar, once the protege of former leader Mahathir Mohamad, was forced from office in 1998 on corruption and sodomy charges he says were part of a conspiracy to ruin his political career.

"I feel vindicated. I feel great that I am back," Anwar told reporters after he was sworn in a day before the government unveils its 2009 budget, which is widely expected to contain populist spending measures.

Ten years since he was last in parliament, Anwar is being backed by the biggest number of opposition MPs in Malaysia's history in his quest to oust the Barisan Nasional coalition that has ruled the country for the past 50 years.

At the same time Anwar must fight new sodomy charges. He denies the charges but if proven they could land him in jail for 20 years, effectively ending the 61-year-old's political career.

Even though Anwar is a respected former finance minister, his move on power after the opposition's surprisingly strong showing in a March general election has rattled financial markets due to fears of a period of prolonged uncertainty.

The Malaysian stock index has fallen more than 25 percent this year and the ringgit currency is close to year lows.

NO CLEAR PATH TO THE TOP

In order to take power, Anwar must win the backing of 30 legislators from the ruling coalition to get a majority in the 222-member parliament.

He has said he will call a confidence vote on September 16 -- six days after he is due to appear in court on the new sodomy charges -- but parliament is in recess for the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

Asked if he was still on track, Anwar simply said: "Yes".

Under the Malaysian constitution there is no such thing as a confidence vote. If Anwar wins over enough MPs, he will send a letter to the king who will either appoint a new government or call new elections, said James Chin, Professor of Political Science at Monash University's Malaysia Campus.

"The way you do it in Malaysia is you lock all of the MPs in a hotel and get them to sign a letter saying that they have lost confidence in the government," he said.

Any defectors from the government would likely want top cabinet posts and that would add to existing tensions among Anwar's fractious coalition of 82 MPs comprising reformers, Islamists and an ethnic Chinese party.

"Anwar is in a very, very difficult position as (Islamist party) PAS has said it would leave the coalition if it does not get the justice and the religious affairs ministry," Chin said.

Anwar's new sodomy trial could last for months, overshadowing his push for power. All homosexual sex is illegal in Malaysia, a mainly Muslim nation of 27 million people.

CHEERS FROM THE CHAMBER

Anwar was straight into parliamentary business after a rapturous welcome from his MPs following the end of a ban on him holding office and a resounding victory in a by-election on Tuesday in a seat vacated by his wife.

The government is trying to push through a bill to force suspects in criminal cases to provide DNA samples, a measure Anwar fears will be used to fabricate evidence against him. He has refused to give a DNA sample in the latest sodomy case.

"The government's desire to push it quickly shows that they are power-crazy and disrespectful to the speaker and the house ... It proves that the government and the cabinet are afraid of people power," Anwar said in parliament.

Anwar was applauded from almost-full opposition benches as he entered the chamber wearing Malay dress and a songkok black hat.

The silent government benches were less than half full.

Anwar wants to put Malaysia back on a fast track to becoming a developed nation and says he will stamp out corruption and end an affirmative action programme for ethnic Malays he says has failed to help them and made the country uncompetitive.

(Reporting by Jalil Hamid; Writing by David Chance; Editing by Paul Tait)

Reuters - Friday, August 29

By R.Sivarasa

SHAH ALAM: It has been just over 11 years since Anwar Ibrahim, newly sacked as deputy prime minister, was first slapped with trumped-up charges of sodomy and supposed corruption anwaribrahim1 (abuse of power), and subsequently put through two trials which were condemned around the world as manifestly flawed and politically motivated.

As a result, he spent six years in detention in Sungei Bulu Prison, in solitary confinement throughout, with contact allowed only with his family and lawyers.

Finally, after his nemesis, former Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamed, went into reluctant retirement in October 2003, Anwar was acquitted and released on 2 September 2004 at the final level of his appeal against the conviction for sodomy.

Now the nightmare is starting all over again. (The new trial has been fixed to run for a month from Jan 25).

On 16 July 2008, Anwar was arrested on a new sodomy charge, after a report was lodged on 28th June 2008 by a junior aide in his office, Saiful Bukhari. Anwar says that the charge is, again, politically motivated, and a renewed attempt to scuttle his political career which has revived dramatically, against all the odds, since his release.

Most people both inside and outside the country agree with this assessment.

The new case replays an old script with new actors. The current script also shows the previous episode's features of political interference, manipulation of officers in the AG's Chambers and police, and falsification of evidence all arising from a political conspiracy to stop Anwar's political career.

A truly suspicious case

There are many facts about the current allegations made by Saiful and his behaviour which are already in the public domain. These facts speak for themselves and immediately show the lack of substance in the fabricated case.

Saiful claimed in his police report of 28th June 2008, made at Hospital Kuala Lumpur (HKL), that he was sodomised by Anwar on the afternoon of Thursday 26th June 2008 at a condominium in Bukit Damansara. His version to the police in his police statement appears to allege that he had been assaulted about 8 to 9 times against his will by Anwar over the previous two months. In his police report made two days later on 28th June 2008, he claims that this incident of sodomy was also against his will.

This version immediately raises suspicion as to why this so-called "victim" is sodomised 8 to 9 times against his will over two months and yet made no complaint to the authorities. During that time, he was in regular contact with Anwar and all the other office staff at Anwar's office.

It has also been revealed that on Wednesday 25th June 2008, the day before the last so-called assault on Thursday, he had met with a senior police officer, Senior Assistant Commissioner Rodwan Mohd Yusof ( then Deputy Director of Criminal Investigation Dept of the Royal Malaysian Police Force, now CPO Melaka ), in the Concorde Hotel in KL in Room 619.

When asked by journalists about this meeting, Rodwan said he had no comment. Rodwan had played a key part in Anwar's 1998/9 cases. In particular, he was notorious for his role in illegally using Anwar's blood sample for DNA testing and was also embroiled in allegations of planting fabricated DNA traces on the infamous mattress brought to court.

In the first trial in 1999, the DNA evidence was so discredited that even the hostile trial judge Augustine Paul was forced to expunge the evidence to assist the prosecution.

It has also since been revealed that the "victim" also met the current Prime Minister, Najib Tun Razak ( then the Deputy Prime Minister ), a few days prior to the alleged incident.

What is interesting about this revelation is that Najib initially denied meeting Saiful to the media, then admitted it, then said the meeting took place because Saiful ( a university drop-out ) was asking him for assistance to get a scholarship, and then told the media that Saiful said he was sodomised by Anwar and looked traumatised during their meeting.

Saiful's behaviour after the so-called assault on that Thursday also raises questions.

The next morning, Saiful went to the Anwar's office as usual. He made no complaints to anyone and appeared quite normal. Later that day, he attended an Anwar Ibrahim Club event at Anwar's house, at which Anwar was also present. There he helped serve coffee to the dozen or so persons present, showed no signs of fear or anxiety, and was able to sit and stand without showing any signs of discomfort.

At 2 pm the following day, which was a Saturday, Saiful went to a private hospital called Pusat Rawatan Islam (Pusrawi ) in Jalan Tun Razak. There he complained to one Dr. Osman that he had had pain in his anus for a few days and that a "plastic" item had been inserted.

A proctoscopy examination by Dr. Osman showed no physical signs of penetration and a normal anus and rectum. After the examination, he then told Dr. Osman he had been sodomised by a VIP and was then advised to go for an examination at a government hospital.

Despite HKL being virtually across the road, it took Saiful two and a half hours to get there. At HKL, where he reported that he had been sodomised, he was examined by three specialist doctors, which was a very unusual procedure in itself.

These three doctors, in their official report, have stated that there were no ""no conclusive clinical findings suggestive of penetration to the anus %u2026" again reinforcing the conclusions of Dr. Osman.

Any objective investigator would have understood that a prosecution for sodomy would get nowhere in the light of such clear medical evidence. No objective prosecutor would have allowed the case to progress.

Here we see the opposite - the investigation being driven fully, although the medical evidence from the outset ruled out penetration. The malice in the investigation further confirms the involvement of political motives.

This investigation was pursued despite the medical findings, which would have been made available immediately to police investigators. Swabs taken from Saiful suspiciously took two days to reach the chemist lab for analysis.

We know now that the prosecution will rely on purported DNA evidence to attempt to prove that Anwar was involved in an act of sodomy with Saiful without his consent.

How a 61-year-old man with a bad back can force himself on a fit and tall 24-year-old will be an interesting question for all observers of this political trial.

The other interesting question will be, in the light of the emphatic medical evidence that there are no clinical findings even suggestive of penetration, the lack of credibility of any DNA report purporting to show Anwar's DNA was found in Saiful's rectum.

Such a report would in fact raise suspicion about the credibility of such DNA evidence - i.e. that such evidence had been fabricated or tampered with, which is easy to do with DNA evidence, especially when the perpetrators are the investigators themselves, as in the 1998 trials.

source - http://freemalaysiatoday.com