I refer to the Malaysiakini report Ex-partner accuses top judge of perjury .

While tax evasion is almost a national pastime, it must be a shock to all and sundry that a Federal Court judge has been accused of understating his income to the tax authorities and thereby committing an offence under the Income Tax Act.

Justice Gopal Sri Ram's former partner has made this allegation and in support of this charge, the ex-partner has attached a copy of Gopal's tax returns for the relevant year.

However, C Vijaya Kumar, the ex-partner, may want to consider whether in doing so, he has exposed himself to possible action form the Inland Revenue Board.

One of its strengths that the IRB holds with great possessiveness is that it treats all tax information with the utmost confidentiality. Section 137 of the Act demands that no ‘classified material’ shall be used in court or otherwise except for the purposes of the Act’ and goes on to say that every classified person shall treat classified material as confidential.

A ‘classified person’ is defined to be, inter alia, any person advising or acting for a person who may be chargeable to tax. The fact that Kumar has tendered a copy of Gopal's 1997 returns will mean nothing - how will he prove that that was the return submitted by Gopal?

The Inland Revenue Board will hardly assist Kumar in authenticating his copy as it would not be allowed to participate in any dispute between two individuals. In fact, it could now be said that someone has contravened the Act by making public Gopal's tax returns and the judge may wish to lodge a complaint with the IRB and demand that it institute an enquiry into the matter.

But he may not want to do that as it would give rise to a classic 'chicken and egg' situation. That would be mean that the returns referred to by Kumar is indeed the one Gopal submitted.

If I were Gopal, I would just sit back and relax. There is no way that Kumar can prove that the returns he is dangling about is the one submitted by the good judge. Nevertheless, I must stress that I am speaking on only the technical aspect of the issue.

And speaking of credibility, I would also like refer to the Malaysiakini report New commission boss vows to restore MACC's credibility .

I am sure that like me, most Malaysians would want to give all assistance possible to the incoming head of the MACC, Abu Kassim Mohamed, in his quest to change the ‘public perception’ of how MACC executes its responsibilities.

I am sure that when he used the term ‘public perception’, he was not referring to any public relations or spin exercise but to real effective and unbiased attention to the body's duties notwithstanding who the crooks may be.

Should Abu Kassim Mohamed be handicapped by not having sufficient leads to possible corrupt practices, I gladly volunteer to offer him two, as follows:

a. A few weeks ago, there was an item in the news of a logging company that was suing the Pahang state government for failing to honour a contract given to the company to carry out logging in a 10,000 acre (or perhaps hectare) tract of forest gifted to Pahang Umno.

I, of course, do not know much about law but I would think that considering the fact that a pesky police officer was recently charged by the ACA for ‘misuse of helicopter’, the granting of a huge logging area to a related political party smacks totally of ‘misuse of forest’.

b. It appears now that an ad company is suing Umno for the wrongful termination of a contract to supply outdoor billboards to the tune of RM546 million.

I am sure that Abu Kassim Mohamed would be dying to know how a political party would rustle up RM546 million for just one aspect of an election campaign.

No doubt he would also be keen on finding out Umno's total budget for the 2008 elections and how it was fortunate to come up with such fabulous funds.

So just do it, Datuk, we are behind you and we are confident that you can change our perception of the MACC. Do not let the challenge of these tasks deter you and do not be anyone's fall guy.