Rama observed that the scepticism was not groundless.

I am very happy to be here, on behalf of Aliran, to speak as a member of the panel at this important public forum.

The gathering of many activists and concerned individuals here is a reliable indication of a growing public awareness that the protection of human rights and the preservation of civil liberties in this country will always require the active participation of conscious citizens.

At the same time, it is no small reminder, which needs to be made over and over again, that there is much work to be done before we can be satisfied with the state of human rights and civil liberties, and with the progress, if we can call it that, in these critical areas of public and political life.

All of us who are here are aware that the broad movement dedicated to protecting human rights and preserving civil liberties in this country long preceded the founding of Suhakam.

Nonetheless it is significant that, three years after it was established, Suhakam is today the subject of a public evaluation in order to ascertain Suhakam’s effectiveness as a human rights commission, and assess its impact as an institution set up to defend human rights and civil liberties.

Scepticism and Suspicion

Indeed, if I may boldly offer my humble opinion, Ladies and Gentlemen, I would say we are here not least to ponder aloud the very future of Suhakam itself.

Those of us who have been involved in the struggle for human rights and civil liberties will remember with what uncertainty and expectations Suhakam’s establishment was greeted in 2000.

Among social activists, politicians and concerned citizens, as I recall, there were some who were dismayed at the way in which the Human Rights Commission of Malaysia Act was rushed through Parliament in September 1999 with scant consultation with civil society organisations. Their well considered comments and critiques are recorded in that invaluable resource document, Human Rights and the National Commission, edited by S. Sothi Rachagan and Ramdas Tikamdas and published by Hakam.

Other people cynically dismissed Parliament’s intention in establishing Suhakam at the time. Who could blame them, for why should the Barisan Nasional-dominated Parliament, habitually sluggish in protecting civil liberties, be rushing to establish a National Commission of Human Rights?

Yet others who knew too well the Barisan Nasional government’s modus operandi could barely believe that the BN government was offering to empower an independent commission to investigate and check the BN’s own record of abuse of human rights and violation of civil liberties.

The scepticism and the suspicion of the national movement for human rights and civil liberties were not groundless. Suhakam was set up in April 2000 – a critical moment when the BN government was responding to popular, legitimate and lawful expressions of dissent with fiercer repression against the leaders of legal opposition parties, social activists, and the promoters of alternative media.

Therefore, many of us asked: could it be that in the name of creating a national human rights commission, the BN government was equipping itself with an institutional tool that would set back the cause of human rights protection?

In short, and heeding Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s advice always to call a spade a spade, let me put it bluntly that many of us who were involved in the struggle for justice and freedom openly wondered if Suhakam would turn out to be a creature of the BN government.

(With due respect to everyone here, and to the Commissioners of Suhakam, let me say that it is not just now that we begin to evaluate Suhakam!)

As always, there were BN apologists who tried very hard to convince the nation, if not the world, that Suhakam’s founding had little to do with public anger over Anwar Ibrahim’s maltreatment and nothing to do with Reformasi’s pressure.

Well, any fool could have told those apologists, simply, that Parliament created the Human Rights Commission of Malaysia Act with indecent haste and the BN government set up Suhakam with public relations fanfare precisely because UMNO’s relevance was under considerable threat.

I’m happy to note that none of us involved in developing a civil society stance vis-à-vis Suhakam in 2000 was a fool.

An Institutional Buffer

Tan Sri Harun Hashim once observed, apropos Suhakam, that, ‘The moment a new body is established there is this great expectation that miracles will happen overnight’.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I don’t speak for the BN government. But it is possible that the BN government placed fond hopes in its half-hearted but carefully scripted establishment of Suhakam. Perhaps the BN government had hoped that setting up Suhakam would miraculously make public disgust over Anwar Ibrahim’s humiliation, Reformasi’s couragous response to lies and repression, and the electoral support for the Barisan Alternatif vanish overnight.

But, with due respect to Tan Sri Harun, I doubt very much that the activists, politicians and concerned inviduals who had long and sincerely struggled for human rights and civil liberties ever entertained great expectations that miracles would happen the moment Suhakam was established.

Had there been a miracle, they and we would probably have welcomed it given the BN government’s dismal abuses of human rights and violations of civil liberties.

But, no, those who genuinely worked to advance the cause of human rights protection were realistic. They expected to find Suhakam placed between the BN government and the national human rights movement.

I say ‘between’ for two reasons.

On the one hand, the BN government (which, as the late Azmi Khalid astutely commented, constantly took away by draconian legislation what the Constitution guaranteed), hoped that Suhakam would be its institutional buffer – to deflect and minimise the anger and dissent in the post-Anwar era.

On the other hand, the national human rights movement had every reason to claim that Suhakam, however limited or manipulated, was a direct outcome of a long struggle to establish an independent mechanism for extending the scope of human rights and civil liberties.

Accordingly, I had always thought that a fundamental assessment of Suhakam’s role and work must determine whether Suhakam is a creature of the BN government, or an ally of the national movement for justice, whether, in other words, Suhakam sides with those who abuse human rights and violate civil liberties or gives true assistance and solidarity to the victims of the same abuses and violations.

Inconclusive Verdict

Today, three years after its founding, perhaps we’re not yet ready to deliver a conclusive verdict on Suhakam’s true colours.

We know that Suhakam has carried out certain duties and tasks which no other government-established and government-funded institution has conducted to date. As a result of some of Suhakam’s studies, reports, workshops and seminars, the public may have learned new things about the deficiencies in the legal system. The public may have become more aware of the injustices and repression committed in the name of ‘national security’ or ‘law and order’, and so on.

On record, some social and political groups have availed themselves of the avenues opened by Suhakam to report abuses and violations to an institution charged with investigating and responding to such reports.

Specifically, we have seen Suhakam defend the constitutional right to assemble of the peaceful protesters and demonstrators during the Kesas Highway march in 2000, or more recently highlight the injustices perpetrated under the Internal Security Act.

We won’t be exaggerating if we warn its Commissioners that Suhakam is in danger of being a warehouse for storing reports and memorandums that the BN government will consistently ignore.

However, Ladies and Gentlemen, much of Suhakam’s work along those lines may be credited to the Commissioners of Suhakam whose terms have not been extended, presumably because their efforts and their commitment to human rights and civil liberties exceeded the low standards of the BN government.

Worse than that, we know that the BN government and the different institutions under its control – the police, the ministries, and the media – displayed scant respect for Suhakam’s Commissioners whenever the Commissioners disagreed with official versions of what was happening to human rights and civil liberties. In fact, these different institutions actually went out of their way to belittle the meaning of having a National Commission of Human Rights.

Since Suhakam was established, the BN government has detained scores of citizens under the ISA, charged others with all kinds of offences, cancelled or disrupted ceramahs, withdrawn the publishing permits of independent periodicals, etc.

Unfortunately Suhakam was not able to prevent or redress those violations of human rights and civil liberties.

In addition, Suhakam has not been able to plan a meaningful role in formulating legislation and policies to safeguard human rights and civil liberties. Indeed we won’t be far wrong in thinking that the BN government will never permit Suhakam to play such a role.

We won’t be exaggerating if we warn its Commissioners that Suhakam is in danger of being a warehouse for storing reports and memorandums that the BN government will consistently ignore.

We won’t be exaggerating if we warn its Commissioners that Suhakam equally faces the danger of remaining a complaints bureau which helps the perpetrator rather than the victims of human rights abuses.

Suhakam could well play the part of deflecting criticisms, dissipating anger and rechan-nelling outrage so that Suhakam’s Commissioners, rather than Parliament and the Executive, end up facing public wrath and dissatisfaction.

Crucial Political Juncture

Ladies and Gentlement, it was in anticipation of Suhakam’s becoming such a creature of the BN government that 32 NGOs ‘disengaged’ with Suhakam for 100 days shortly after Tan Sri Abu Talib replaced Tan Sri Musa Hitam as Chairman of Suhakam.

The disengagement definitely expressed disillusionment with Suhakam’s seeming helplessness. But the disengagment was also a protest against the BN government. In particular the 32 NGOs had noted that the BN government had showed no respect for Suhakam’s recommendations and no intention to comply with those recommendations.

Moreover, the NGOs had directly criticized the appointment of Tan Sri Abu Talib as the Chairman of Suhakam. No one had forgotten that Abu Talib had completely sided with the BN government when the latter abused human rights and violated civil liberties, especially during Operasi Lalang in 1987 and the judicial crisis in 1988.

Ladies and Gentlemen, Suhakam was founded at a crucial political juncture. In evaluating its performance, we must remember that we have arrived at another critical juncture.

We stand on the eve of a transition of power from Dr Mahathir to the remaining UMNO and BN leaders. We recall that past transitions often involved fierce factional fights within UMNO that led to serious violations of human rights and civil liberties, not least for different and innocent groups of citizens not involved in any ruthless competition for power.

We stand within months of another General Election. And past elections have shown just with what impunity the BN government can undermine the rights of citizens and legal parties to participate in the electoral and broader democratic processes.

A few weeks ago we saw the release of Parti Keadilan National leaders and social activists unjustly detained under the ISA for two years. Yet we know that scores of other citizens remain imprisoned under the ISA in equally unjust ways.

Year by year our democratic space has been curtailed. Daily our freedom of expression is severely restricted. Our basic right to the freedom of assembly is apparently no longer recognized by the BN.

Citizens who are detained fear for their safety in police custody. Ironically, we might even say, some of the most blatant abuses of human rights and cynical violations of civil liberties have taken place after Suhakam’s establishment.

Being mindful of the times in which we live, we must realize that any evaluation of Suhakam’s ability to protect human rights and preserve civil liberties, cannot simply be an exercise in pointing how much Suhakam has done, what its limitations are and how much more it must achieve.

All those are important questions which I hope we can all help to answer fairly.

Yet, I humbly suggest, if we want to assess Suhakam’s effectiveness accurately, we must be able to answer a fundamental question – is Suhakam turning into the creature of the BN government? Will the Commissioners of Suhakam allow themselves, individually and collectively, to be mere tools of social and political control?

No doubt the Commissioners of Suhakam, present ones and future ones, will want to answer those questions themselves. But for those of us who have been part of the national human rights movement, we must always be clear that when we assess Suhakam’s performance as a national commission of human rights, we assess no less than Suhakam’s future.

The above speech was presented at the National Consultation: SUHAKAM After 3 Years: Recommendations For Promotion and Protection of Human Rights and Government’s Response” held in Penang on 5 July 2003. The event was organized by ERA Consumer with the collaboration of Aliran and the Penang Consumers Protection Association.

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