Aliran is shocked to hear Deputy Prime Minister Abdullah Badawi saying that "the cabinet will decide on Wednesday whether to make public the Commission of Inquiry's report on the assault on Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim while in police custody." (The Sun, 12 April 1999)

Aliran hopes that the DPM and the cabinet will not go back on Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad's word that the Commission's findings will be made public. Dr Mahathir is on record as having said "…there is no point in having an inquiry which will not be made public." (The Sun, 7 April 1999)

We hope that the cabinet will bear in mind that the Commission of Inquiry was set up in the first place in response to public demand to investigate the cowardly attack on Anwar Ibrahim and to identify the assailant so that justice can be done.

Let us not forget that the Commission was set up in the public interest; public funds were made available for the functioning of the Commission; public funds made it possible for the report to be compiled and bound for circulation. And public interest demands that the report be made public. It is only logical and sensible to do so.

Any decision to hide the report from public scrutiny will therefore be a travesty of justice.

P Ramakrishnan
President
13 April 1999