Aliran calls upon the Bar Council to save the judiciary. It is only the Bar Council that can do this. The Council and its members are well placed to play this role effectively and successfully. No one else can purge and cleanse the judiciary. We call upon the Bar Council to undertake this great task in the national interest and as a matter of patriotic duty. The Bar Council should call for an Extraordinary General Meeting and adopt a resolution calling for the boycott of the courts until such time when an Independent Commission of Inquiry is set up comprising individuals of impeccable integrity. The resolution should further direct the members of the Bar Council to shun all those judges who are deemed to have leap-frogged over more senior and deserving serving judges.
It is abundantly clear and established beyond any shadow of doubt – as can be seen through the Lingam tapes - that the promotion and appointment of judges are based on political manipulation and sinister manoeuvring by unscrupulous parties to secure their power base. They have sacrificed justice and have made a mockery of a hallowed institution that was meant to uphold justice and fairness.
This is one occasion which makes it possible to reform and rejuvenate the judiciary and deliver it from the doldrums it has been forced into by unscrupulous and unethical persons garbed in judicial robes. Uncouth lawyers with their political connections and close associations with discredited judges have tainted the fair name of justice and have brought shame and disrepute to the judiciary.
It is with pride that Aliran remembers members of the Bar in the mould of Raja Aziz Addruse who refused to appear before the Supreme Court presided by Tun Hamid Omar on a matter of principle following the executive assault on the judiciary in 1988. Hamid played an active role in the dismissal of Tun Salleh Abas and the sacking of Tan Sri Wan Suleiman and Datuk George Seah - the three innocent victims of a political plot. He was shunned like a leper and that’s the way to treat all the co-plotters who have ruined the judiciary.
Aliran has no doubt that the Bar will rise up to this occasion and set an example for the rest of the country to follow so that sanity, democracy and decency will be restored to our national life.
P Ramakrishnan
President
21 September 2007
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