In the past two weeks, the Home Minister Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein kept reminding the country that the street crime rate and the crime index have fallen by 39% and 15% respectively in the first quarter of the year, well beyond the 20% and 5% target set by the end of the year.
For the first quarter of last year 9,984 cases were reported while during the same period this year it went down to 6,158 cases.
Hishammuddin’s statement was repeated in a major local newspaper today.
There should be a sense of joy and relief that Malaysia is becoming a safer country, which is not only a fundamental right of Malaysian citizens and the most basic duty of any competent government in a civilized society, but also important in enhancing our international competitiveness to attract foreign investments so that Malaysia can take the quantum leap to escape the decade-long middle-income trap to become a developed high income country.
However, such a national sense of relief and joy is distinctly missing in public response and reaction to Hishammuddin’s repeated announcements in the past fortnight of a sharp drop of street crime rate and crime index in the first quarter of the year – to the extent that Hishamuddin’s announcement had to be repeated in a major national daily today.
Why is this so?
Malaysians are not niggardly in according praises when they are due and I have no doubt that Malaysians will not be stingy in singing praises for the police if they now feel safe and secure, for themselves and their loved ones as well as their property, whether in the streets, public places or the privacy of their homes.
The reason why such praises are absent is very simple – there is no national sense of joy or relief despite Hishamuddin’s repeated announcements of police statistics of the crime National Key Result Area (NKRA) of the Government Transformation Programme (GTP) for the simple reason that Malaysians do not feel that they have now safer cities, safer streets and safer homes.
In recent months, whether to influence police crime statistics or otherwise, there appears to be a reluctance on the part of the police to receive police reports. In my visit to Tawau early this month, I was told of a case where the police told a robbery victim that he need not lodge a report until the robber had been caught.
When Hishammuddin first became Home Minister last April, he commissioned opinion polls on the Home Ministry official website, which came out with three findings:
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*97% or 9,729 out of 10,060 respondents felt unsafe because of the high crime rate, with only 1% or 89 respondents felt safe and 2% or 242 respondents in the “uncertain” category.
? *95% or 8,883 out of 9,319 respondents felt that the safety of the people was not guaranteed as compared to 3% or 248 respondents who felt it was still guaranteed, with 2% or 188 respondents in the “uncertain” category.
? *94% or 8,743 out of 9,261 respondents felt that government had not done its best to ensure that the safety of the people was at the best level with 2% or 185 respondents felt that the government had done its best, and 4% or 333 persons “uncertain”.
Hishammuddin “rubbished” these findings when I asked him in Parliament.
If the Home Minister himself refuses to accept the validity of the opinion polls conducted by the Home Ministry’s official website, why should Hishammuddin expect Malaysians to accept at face value his statistics that the street crime rate and the crime index have fallen by 39% and 15% respectively in the first quarter of the year, particularly when Malaysians do not feel comparatively safer as compared to last year?
One eloquent index whether Malaysia is becoming a safer country is whether there is mushrooming or reduction in the number of private guarded-and-gated communities, where Malaysians have to be burdened with an additional expenditure to have safer neighbourhoods when this is basic law-and-order responsibility of the Police and Government.
Now Malaysians have woken up to another shock – that on top unsafe cities, unsafe neighbourhoods, unsafe streets, unsafe homes, there is now unsafe schools as revealed by a recent Star expose on a “terror school” in Rawang where school gangs in the secondary school make it hell for the 3,000 students, together with the shocking revelation of the case of a 14-year-old girl being repeatedly raped by several of her classmates in various locations of the school over a three-week period.
The time has come for the formation of a Parliamentary Caucus on Crime and Security to help Hishammuddin and the Police to restore to Malaysians their fundamental rights – safe neighbourhoods, safe streets, safe homes and safe schools.
I will make this proposal when a Parliamentary Roundtable on Democratic Policing is held.
I will discuss the idea of a Pakatan Rakyat initiative to convene a Parliamentary Roundtable on Democratic Policing with Parliamentary Opposition Leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim and PAS President Datuk Seri Hadi Awang when I attend the Parti Keadilan Rakyat Congress in Kota Baru on Saturday.
It is timely that another Parliamentary Roundtable on Democratic Policing be held, dealing not only with the current public concerns about the alarming rate of trigger-happy police shootings and fatalities, like the 14-year-old Aminulrasyhid Amzah in Shah Alam on April 26 and 18-year-old Mohd Afham Arin in Johore Bahru in October last year, but also to revisit the Dzaiddin Police Royal Commission Report 2005 and its 125 recommendations to create an efficient, incorruptible, professional world-class police service.
No keris bin lembudin does not need help. What he needs is a spaceman suit (make it Armani pls) and a one way ticket to outer space.
“97% or 9,729 out of 10,060 respondents felt unsafe because of the high crime rate, with only 1% or 89 respondents felt safe and 2% or 242 respondents in the “uncertain” category.”
For all you know, out of the 89 respondents, accounting for the 1%, most of them felt safe because they themselves are the criminals, LOL. In any case, we have learnt not to believe in Malaysian government statistics. That the police told a robbery victim that he need not lodge a report until the robber had been caught is not something surprising in Malaysia.
according to these umno conmen, not only do we have the lowest crime rate in the galaxy, but also the the galaxy’s fastest internet speeds, the galaxy’s cheapest petrol, the galaxy’s best education system, the galaxy’s greatest pm, the galaxy’s best first lady, the galaxy’s greatest astronaut, the galaxy’s finest democratic system, and so on….i want to cry with joy
Had he been born in bolehland, Luke Skywalker would had died of old age as a rubber tapper, instead of fighting the evil galactic empire. Because there is simply no evil, no corruption, no tyranny and no undemocratic practices under the reign of umno in this part of the galaxy.
Those UMNO B idiots cannot understand they are elected and paid to do a good job.
Lousy performances for months…[deleted] worked a little…get better result…and tell all Malaysians…..the so call good news.
Day in day out…feeling no shame…glorify themselves…for sweet nothing.
Meanwhile….the bad news is petrol up by 15 sen and on going leading a chain reaction to few essentials..making the poor getting poorer.
UMNO B will never tell you how filthy rich our country is and can withstand any outside forces to make us suffer….because these blood suckers suck all our money away…making the country poor.
Yes UMNO B is the real sick men of Asia..bringing all Malaysians to be like them.
The only difference between us and them..is that they became filthy rich with false titles..and we are really poor…due to these evil doers.
Police officer who wear uniform and carry pistol harassing illegal worker is a crime?
Many of us saw even traffic police with another hiding under pedestrian walkway waiting cars to beat yellow light and stopping them is a crime?
By rigth all enforcement duty is to protect the rakyat, on the contrary, most of police or traffic police mind when on duty is to cari jalan to harass the rakyat especially foreign workers.
Is really a laughing stock when hisapmudin tell rakyat that our crime rate declining..haha.
Hishamuddin is seeing a mirage of crime reduction rates!!
YB Kit,
Please do not harper too much hope on Hishamuddin in term of his capacity as the Home Minister. He may not stay too long as the Home Minister.
Najib’s hidden political rival in Umno, his deputy Mudyiddin, will soon plot for Rosmah to get involved in as much as possible bank borrowing deals in the name of Rosmah as a very important business crony, while the deals will be engineered by Muhyiddin’s gangs. When comes the next Umno party election, Rosmah-related businesses will see problems of insolvency and bankruptcy, in order to disrepute Rosmah and Najib.
Najib and Hishamuddin will never stay long in power in view of his lack of strong support from Dr Mahathir.
joking, i wouldn’t believe these statistics and i just believe police are starting to abusing their power since their enjoying shooting anyone they are not happy with. I enjoyed looking at those police riding motorbike going to each shop like cybercafe,snooker etc to ask for ‘duit kopi’. This reminds me of old era of Hong Kong before ICAC is born.
Hishamuddin has nothing to proud about.
Reporting to Police in many many cases a tiresome but no-performance job for many who had been reporting. The Report could be made in one police/station and you have to go to the responsible headquarter to be questioned again. Depending if the Inspector assigned is there or have time to do so. Only the Inspector is at the room doing the job. In one way, it is too much for an officer doing the clerical work. But, as such you never know the reliability of such reporting. The officer can even puff in saying there is no case, or, the reporter does not even have to sign their the Statement!!Many a time, the officer was phoning or receiving calls or other interruptions that draw a Statement from the necessary of an hour to hours!! And, then, it will be dragged to be at the decision of their Supervior/Superintendent if to act!! If are God & Ghost!!
The Basic Code of Practice, efficiency, or, Discipline are not there. So, what the use of talking figures, WHEN POLICE IS NOT A POLICE!!
In the lawyer assaulting Clients cases in April 2008 in Penang, even Police station was within 5-10minutes from the site, no Police went to the sites after being called, nor, investigation report being produced!!
The Police/KUP/AG cannot even answer this Straight forwards case including Cheating involving a notorious lawyer!!
1. Replace the HM with a more qualified person
2. Sack the PIG and send him to the slaughter-house
3. Appoint Semi-V as the acting PM (P…. M….)
Friends, instead of only relying on the police, let us band together to beat crime by caring for our neighbours’ security. Be nosy! Ask your neighbours where they are going for the holidays, and when they will be returning! Tell them of your own holiday-plans
By the way, my neighbour’s house was robbed during the Wesak holidays. Three house-holds were on holiday, one robbed. You see, we did not make any security arrangements with other neighbours.
Illegal immigration and drug-addiction are the main causes of crime.
On the bright side, some time back, I managed to send an intruder tumbling away from my neighbour’s door with a right stentorian roar.