| 2004-01-05 | Pak Lah, calling for a Royal Commission, says the people do not trust the police THE PRIME MINISTER, DATO' SERI Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, now says it: the Royal Malaysia Police is not trusted. He says: "We want to make the police force a unit which can be trusted." He admits the public is not gung-ho about the police. He proposes a Royal Commission to report how it could be turned around. It would look investigate and suggest how it could, and how to reduce human rights abuses, police brutality, poor service and other ills that make the public afraid to approach the police. He was opening a conference of 300 senior police officers in Putra Jaya on 29 December 2003. What he said it is not new. The Opposition parties and groups have said so for years. What is new is that his implied admission that the public is frightened of the police.
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| 2004-01-03 | An UMNO bigwig is assaulted, so it is war on illegal racers Dato' Chor could not contain himself: he will have the illegal racers charged in court, once he has the evidence, which he wants fast. So the usual suspects are readied for punishment. He says the races are held in the night, at short notice, that they are gone when the police, on a tipoff, come to the scene. But is it as simple as that? After decades of illegal racing, is the police so clueless that it does not know? I took just a weekend several months ago to find out about it, talking to the rootless at late night teh tarik stalls in Kampung Kerinchi. So could Dato' Chor and his ilk if they would gain their confidence and talk to them as individuals, not as miscreants. If the police is clueless, it is for the very good reason in the public's mind that they are not there to help. The prime minister, Dato' Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, said so and has called for a Royal Commission to look into it. It was not always so. In my youth, the policeman was a friend. He gave you a lift when he is in a jeep and you are walking home from school. Try that now!
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