COMMENT The presumptuous conclusion by the royal commission of inquiry (RCI) that Teoh Beng Hock was driven to commit suicide - even though the experts had not concluded so - should be an occasion for Malaysians to ponder the debasement of commissions of inquiry set up by the BN/Alliance government over the years.

During the recent phone hacking scandal by the News of the World in Britain, Prime Minister David Cameron was forced to immediately set up a commission of inquiry. He did this first of all by consulting the leader of the opposition, Ed Miliband and they then discussed the composition of the commission.