30/01: Keystone Cops galore

Posted By: Raja Petra

On 14 January 2008, the one-time Director of the Commercial Crime Division, Ramli Yusuff, was charged for not declaring 20,000 Telekom Malaysia shares that he had purchased. His asset declaration was made on 17 September 2007 but he did not buy the shares until the next day, 18 September 2007.

Last year, in this same column, we said that Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi has been given four 'good' election dates by his Feng Shui master -- 19 May 2007, 25 November 2007, 15 December 2007 and 15 March 2008. This Feng Shui master, the same person who also gave Abdullah the March 2004 election date, is supposed to be very good. I suppose, considering that Abdullah's March 2004 election victory was the best in the history of Malaysian elections, this is probably proof of how good he is.

If Abdullah misses these dates -- he has already missed three and has only one date left -- then he will have to obtain a new set of dates. But that would mean the elections will have to be after 14 April 2008, which also means Anwar Ibrahim can then contest the election.

Umno feels that Anwar is no longer relevant and therefore it does not matter whether he does or does not contest. Whether Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) wins any seats this time around will depend on the support the party has and not because Anwar is or is not contesting. Of course, if Anwar does not contest, then PKR will not enjoy the benefit of Anwar sitting in Parliament. But this should not in any way result in PKR not winning any seats or winning one seat less just because Anwar is not contesting.

For example, If Abdullah Ahmad Badawi decides to stay out of the general election and remain just as the Umno Party President while handing over the post of Prime Minister to, say Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah, this does not mean Umno is going to be wiped out. It will in fact mean that Umno will do even better. Ooops.....I better take that back. If Umno does just this then the opposition would be finished. The voters will all swing back to Barisan Nasional. Nah....can't happen....and I hope they do not do this like what Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad did just before the 2004 general election which saw Barisan Nasional perform their best ever.

Okay, enough about the elections for the meantime. The opposition is in a shambles. They are still quarrelling over constituencies. They refuse to present a joint or common election manifesto to the voters. They all have super-huge egos and think they are all so terra. And so on and so forth. The next general election is just over the horizon and the opposition is acting like spoilt brats. Let us leave them to sort out their problems and squabbling, if they can, and in the meantime let us look at another issue while we wait for the opposition to get their act together or go into self-destruct mode that will send them into oblivion.

The matter we want to talk about today relates to the documents below.

The first document is a charge sheet against the one-time Director of the Commercial Crime Division, Ramli Yusuff. The charge sheet is dated 14 January 2008. According to this charge sheet, Ramli was alleged to have purchased 20,000 Telekom Malaysia shares without declaring them. The asset declaration, according to the charge sheet, was made on 17 September 2007.

This means, in short, on 17 September 2007, Ramli declared his assets but did not declare the 20,000 Telekom Malaysia shares as being part of his assets. But then, if you look at the next document (BURSA MALAYSIA DEPOSITORY: Statement of accounts for the period 9 January 2007 to 18 September 2007), you will see that the 20,000 Telekom Malaysia shares were purchased on 18 September 2007.

So, if the asset declaration by Ramli was made on 17 September 2007, how could he have declared shares he bought the following day, on 18 September 2007, when he had not bought them yet? He was being asked to declare assets he owned and not assets he suspects he might own in future.

Interesting is it not? And if this is the quality of Malaysia's prosecution team and the stupidity they display, then I would like to apply for the job of Attorney-General because I am absolutely, 100% confident I am smarter and would certainly not make blunders such as these.

This story does not end here though. There are many more interesting aspects to this case but we shall reveal them slowly, one-by-one. Good wine must be sipped, not slurped, so we shall slowly sip all this evidence as Malaysia Today reveals them one at a time.

Stay tuned to be entertained with evidence of how stupid Malaysia's Attorney-General Chambers is. But then you already knew that without Malaysia Today having to tell you is that not so?