Aliran Media Statement


Anwar's Guilty Verdict: No Big Surprise

The Anwar Ibrahim verdict doesn't come as a surprise or as a shock to Aliran and the majority of Malaysians. It was as expected.

It became increasingly clear to the lay person that Anwar's case was doomed as the trial progressed. After the defence had demolished the prosecution's attempts to prove sexual misconduct, the court allowed the prosecution's application for the charges to be amended so that actual sexual misconduct need not be proved.

The court then ruled that 25 days of trial evidence - evidence which the defence counsel argued was crucial and favourable to the defence - was irrelevant and ordered it expunged from court records -

What's more, the defence was also not allowed to call 10 witnesses to establish police conspiracy. Anwar's black eye and his treatment in police custody was deemed irrelevant to the case.

During the trial, the judge also ruled that the defence had to show the relevance of witnesses before they were called by submitting a summary of their testimony beforehand. The ruling was most unusual and, in effect, obliged the defence to reveal its hand in advance, thus forewarning the prosecution to the evidence to be adduced from defence witnesses.

A key line of defence - that certain powerful personalities conspired to topple Anwar - was initially allowed but later repeatedly ruled as 'irrelevant'. At one point, Anwar's lead counsel Raja Aziz Addruse, driven to desperation after yet another "irrelevant" ruling, remarked, "I don't know what is relevant anymore."

This case more than any other has caused Malaysians to question what jurisprudence is all about. In such a state of confusion, they must have wondered whether it was Anwar who was in the dock or the system of justice itself.

Indeed, never before has the judicial system been under such intense and prolonged public scrutiny as during the Anwar trial. Malaysians will now draw their own conclusions - "irrelevant" though they may be - about the state of the judicial system in the country.

The late Lord Denning's once observed: "Justice must be rooted in confidence" - and confidence is destroyed when right-minded people go away confused and bewildered.

Aliran Executive Committee
14 April 1999