Friday, March 12, 2010

MY FRIDAY GUEST BLOGGER: MARTIN JALLEH


In his latest scathing critique, N H CHAN said the rakyat is “stunned by the ignorance of our judges of the highest court in the land”, as seen in the recent Federal Court’s decision not to review Anwar Ibrahim’s application to review its previous decision dismissing his application for disclosure of documents for his second sodomy trial.


The integrity of the judiciary has been badly mauled by a legal lion who does not mince his words no matter how high or mighty a judge thinks he is. He has called a spade a spade and certain members of the judiciary an “incompetent” and even an “idiotic” bunch!
All the Chief Justice (CJ) and the judges in the Palace of Justice have managed to do is remain mum, mute and mumble amongst themselves as N H Chan methodically makes them out for who they really are and the mockery they have made of the law!
The respected, renowned and retired Justice N H Chan is very frustrated, fed-up and furious at how the judiciary which he had served so faithfully has been reduced to a farce run by those who are legal and intellectual frauds or what he has called “imposters”!  



With each passing compromised judgment N H Chan unhesitatingly hits out at judges with an increasingly sharper sting. He leaves no stone unturned, no errant judge uncovered. They can “no longer mask their hyperbole judgments with unintelligible garbage”.    
 

 

 
“Fools on the bench”

In his latest scathing critique, he said the rakyat is “stunned by the ignorance of our judges of the highest court in the land”, as seen in the recent Federal Court’s decision not to review Anwar Ibrahim’s application to review its previous decision dismissing his application for disclosure of documents for his second sodomy trial.

N H Chan said the Federal Court’s approach to Rule 137 of the Rules of the Federal Court 1995 was “inconsistent” and “dishonest” and “those ignoramuses” were talking “utter nonsense”. Those “inane judges cannot even understand plain English”! He put it very plainly and painfully!
Calling the three-member panel of Justice Zulkefli Ahmad Makinuddin, Mohd Ghazali Mohd Yusoff and Heliliah Mohd Yusof “incompetent”, he added “perhaps they were clowns as their statements were laughable”.

His searing criticism was that they “…do not know justice from injustice”, and that “such lowly individuals should never be allowed to sit on the seat of Justice…(and) to be judges at all. And yet there are so many of them in the judiciary today ever since the rot begun.”

He shredded into smithereens the “judicial renaissance” of the CJ: “Our country does not need impostors, who pose as judges, to deceive the common people any longer. The common citizenry can now uncover the impostors hiding beneath the mantle of the judicature.”

He laid bare the judicial sham: “With judges such as these in the Malaysian judiciary where, to them, the principles of the law are not to be consonant with justice to be manipulated by them to uphold injustice, it is no wonder that the errant judges have forfeited the confidence of the people. ”

He left them with a stinging slap in the face: “The general public does not respect such judges anymore! They have put themselves beyond the pale. Just like pariahs. Don’t you think they should be despised?”

On High Court judge Justice Mohamad Zabidin Mohd Diah’s rejection of Anwar’s application to have the judge recuse himself from further hearing the sodomy trial, N H Chan said that the judge was talking “utter nonsense” and “knew next to nothing about judicial bias”.

He added that the “moral of this unsavoury episode” is this: if you appoint mediocre lawyers to the Bench you will get substandard judges. The solution to this problem is a simple one. Appoint judges from the cream of the legal profession and you will not find me assailing the judges for incompetence simply because I will not be able to do so.”

Such was his cutting conclusion: “It is only when we have fools on the bench that I can point out that what they have decided is not the law.”   



“Bunch of idiots in high places”

N H Chan had not spared the judges in the cases related to the Perak constitutional crisis of his very strong language when scrutinising their decisions (with the exception of Kuala Lumpur High Court Justice Abdul Aziz Abdul Rahim whom he had praised).

He highlighted the “bad” and “perverse” judgments, especially those in the appellate courts, the collective written judgements which were “riddled with contradictions” and how the Perak and Federal Constitutions were toyed with and trampled on by the judges!

During the Perak debacle N H Chan had said that there are “many of our judges today especially among those judges in the higher echelon of the judicial hierarchy who do not seem to know the true meaning of separation of powers in constitutional law. This is most apparent.”

He called some of the judges of the cases of the Perak imbroglio:
a) Bad judges – they “seem to think that independence means that they can do what they like”
b) Recalcitrant judges – “they think that words can mean whatever they want them to mean”
c) Humpty Dumpty judges – “they also think that they are independent of the legislature”.

N H Chan has brought to light how beholden the judiciary is to the Umno-dominated Government. He said the “so-called Perak crisis has brought out a host of cases that showed that the judges gave the impression that they were one-sided. The perception of the people is that they sided with the BN government.”

In the “shocking case” of Zambry v Sivakumar in the Federal Court, he called the judgment by the “infamous five” (judges) Alauddin Mohd Sheriff , Arifin Zakaria, Nik Hashim Ab Rahman, Augustine Paul and Ahmad Makinnuddin, a “perverse decision”.

In the case of Nizar vs Zambry he called the panel of five Federal Court judges made up of the President of the Court of Appeal Alauddin Mohd Sheriff, Chief Judge of Malaya Arifin Zakaria, Zulkefli Ahmad Makinuddin, Ghazali Mohd Yusoff and Abdul Hamid Embong, “myopic judges”.

They “were lost in a quagmire of confused thinking caused by their own incompetence. They found themselves deep in the forest unable to see the wood for the trees. Does this mean that we have a bunch of incompetent judges who sit in the highest court in the land?”

Alas, with the help of N H Chan the public especially those in Perak were able to see for themselves how members of the judiciary had left behind a dead constitution, “bad” and “perverse” decisions, dubious declaratory orders, judgments devoid of reasoned grounds, and disgraceful double standards.  



 Blind and Biased Judges
N H Chan has “judged the judges”. He considers them, especially those in the appellate courts’ “ignorant”, “inane”, “incompetent” and even “idiots” (which he has strongly inferred).

The public shares his view. In their eyes the judiciary has allowed itself to be intimidated, its independence and impartiality interfered with, and its integrity reduced to ignominy.

In the light of the severe criticism of N H Chan of the judiciary (which is quite unprecedented by a retired judge), surely the Chief Justice cannot stand idly, silently and stoically by – unless Zaki Azmi strenuously, staunchly and solemnly agrees with him!

Further if Zaki continues to remain silent the public will assume that he shares N H Chan's searing criticism of the judiciary. Logically he would have to resign for he has allowed the reputation of the judiciary to be sullied irreparably.

The judicial shenanigans whom N H Chan has criticized and castigated should also resign for having shamelessly sacrificed justice on the altar of political expediency.

N H Chan’s comments on members of the judiciary have no doubt been bold, blunt and blistering. He has accused judges of being blind, biased and being a bunch of “idiots” and “fools”. He has thrown the gauntlet down   






If the CJ disagrees with N H Chan’s criticisms he should haul the former Court of Appeal judge into court and demand that the latter shows cause for why he should not be cited for contempt! Does Zaki have the guts to take up the gauntlet or will he prefer to allow the judicial circus to go on?

N H Chan has made no bones about it. His blitzkrieg on the judiciary will continue. “Bad guys” had better beware! He will ensure that their names remain in infamy for generations to come unless they recant the wrongs that they have done! He will even write their obituary and if they outlive him there will be others who will take his place!

N H Chan sees the next general elections as the only solution to an unsalvageable judiciary viewed by the public with greater suspicion, skepticism and even scorn. He once commented: “At the present time and judging by what we have experienced so far from the Perak takeover cases, the quality of most of our judges is suspect”.

“In the meantime what should we do with so many bad apples in the barrel? If only there could be a change in government in the next general elections with the opposition winning by a landslide. Then we could get rid of all the bad apples by Act of Parliament.”  






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Martin Jalleh is a social commentator and was formerly in the prestigious Consumer Association of Penang. He has been a rugular contributor to Aliran for as long as I can remember.










20 comments:

Anonymous said...

NH Chan , Sir, pls give us MORE, tq !

tupingera said...

They are not fools but whores who prostitue "justice" for personal gain.

Anonymous said...

I always enjoy Martin's courageous no-hold-barred articles. Look forward to more great stuff from him. As for NH Chan, what can we say except that man of such courageous are far too few in the country today. A country where men in power are totally evil, without any conscience or any hint of decency. I just hope that there will be more like these two great gentlemen in time to come. God, we do need them.

Alibaba

Anonymous said...

charge CHAN lah for contempt kalau berani !!

Anonymous said...

I have a dream.
Soon there will be a GE.
There will be a shift of power.
I dream for a better Malaysia.
Why?
I am tired. Very tired of reading the blogs, nothing bad interpretations and expositions of bad management.
I have a dream.
Malaysia will be a better place to stay.
I have a dream.
When I am awake after the GE, it is not just another nightmare.

Donplaypuks® said...

More ex-Justices like NH Chan should speak up.

The integrity and calibre of our top judges have been questioned for well over 20 years now. The 2008 RCI showed the extent to which our judiciary has been compromised.

Silence is not an option!

dpp
We are all of1 race, the Human Race

Anonymous said...

Dream on Malaysians, dream on, the dreams of my father(ala Barack Obama)..... if, you continue to cast your votes to those incompetent fools running the country.
As they say.... you deserve the government you voted for!And now you suffer fools. How true.But how to beat the government machineries come election time next...? That is the question and the key to all our miseries now.

Jong said...

WOW, the long silence is definitely deafening!

Such a disgrace, retired Justice NH Chan must be so sick to the teeth that he had used all the superlatives to aptly describe them - yeah call a spade a spade, how else!

Those rogues didn't see it coming eh?! The truth is so painful huh?

Anonymous said...

Not only a bunch of idiots, also be called a group of traitors


Together stand as one and flush out this group of idiots cum traitors.

RAKYAT Power.

Anonymous said...

aiya, where is the CJ from? PERIOD lor. Burn some more marriage certs? how about some rail contracts? oh, its the past and lets give him credit ok for dispensing justice fast.

Sure, ok.

Anonymous said...

there is ONLY one brave one so far & i'm proud to be an Ipoh guy !

nstman said...

The whole world knows what is happening to our hitherto hallowed institutions. Only the prostitutes in Umno seem to be living in orgasmic fantasy. The solution? Kick these bastards out in the next election. NH Chan has thrown down the gauntlet. The ball is at Umno's court.

Anonymous said...

anyone with some sense of integrity knows that Federal and Appeals Court are burdened with UMNO judges, who sit there to protect UMNO's interest and not to administer justice according to the rule of law.

By the way, who is the Cheif Justice? Where is he from? And someone so closely linked to UMNO via business and politics previously, what do you expect from him? Oh, by the way when this CJ was appointed didnt the Bar Council react positively with some glowing speeches?

ktteokt said...

More ex-judges should speak up, but can AUGUSTINE PAUL?

teo siew chin said...

I wonder what the youngest-ever Lord President of the Federal Court of Malaysia who was appointed on 12 November 1982, now retired, has to say about the current board of judges.
oops...nobody wants to hear his opinion? ;)

Jong said...

It will be most interesting to know what is in Justice NH Chan mind and how he would describe the Perak royalty.

I certainly don't think it will be nice.

nstman said...

In Malaysia, men of integrity like NH Chan are sidelined. Idiots, fools, carpetbaggers, buffoons, bumbling fools are given due recognition. Many are now holding high office. So, if you dream of reaching the stars in this country, just do stupid things, and you will be rewarded. Malaysia Boleh, Tiuniamah Boleh, lanchau pun boleh. Umno boleh.

Anonymous said...

if only our bloggers would be more fortright with the way the gomen is
running.....

Can i propose that blogging theme the year 2010 be named -
the year that we called a spade spade


no need to be diplomatic in our criticism of the gomen or the opposition

only by doing this can we hope that the country will be better managed and people wouuld be proud to call themselves malaysians

among the influential bloggers that are listed in the sopo-sentral are 'ball carriers'
of the past and present pee eems
and the pr leadership

high time that you , zorro, do a
critique of them , friends and foes alike


notoktok

Anonymous said...

quality of judges suspect?

more than that. the majority are lapdogs salivating for crumbs from UMNO.

Boo Toh Hang said...

Nothing new. Just free all the criminals from the jails and the judiciary will be hailed as the best in the universe.

Let the PR buggers go skrew some dogs backside and that is justice all right.

They are above the law anyway.

So if you want justice, go open the prison gates and invite the prisoners to live in your house, then justice is served, Pakatan style.