“Police business is a hell of a problem. It’s a good deal like politics. It asks for the highest type of men, and there’s nothing in it to attract the highest type of men. So we have to work with what we get...”

- Raymond Chandler, ‘The Lady in the Lake’

I have a “guilt by association” complex when it comes to journalists or former journalists. While what I write has nothing to do with journalism, whenever a journalist is harassed - someone once told me, once a journalist always a journalist - I have an overwhelming feeling of simpatico for journalists who are threatened by the Umno state.

It is ironic that in a fascist state or a state trending to fascism, the written word sometimes becomes powerful in ways that could never be in lands of the free. It is also notable that in such states the police force always reminds citizens that it is the fair and just instrument of the state.

Reading the Facebook posting of Norlin Wan Musa (photo) on the treatment meted out to her husband, former journalist Sidek Kamiso, is like reading the testimonials of people who live in countries where even the pantomime of democracy has been discarded in favour of whatever kind of tyranny that the state chooses to indulge in.

When Norlin asks, “What have we become”, the answer to that question is reflected in the actions of those who invaded her home, menaced her family and dragged her husband across state lines to face charges brought on by cowardly men who file police reports as a means to stifle free speech. This is 1Malaysia in all its glory.

As I wrote when the crown prince of Johor discovered that the practitioners of the dark arts were monitoring him, “There is always that line a Malaysian crosses. That line that nobody used to talk about but these days the state assures us is there and there will be consequences if we cross it.”

What exactly are these “consequences”? If you are going to the United Nations with the intention of “addressing issues such as the refugee crisis and securing global peace” then the least you could have is a security apparatus that does not issue threats to opposition politicians and harasses former journalists for tweeting about a deceased divisive religious operative.

Furthermore, it would behove those who pontificate on such matters, especially on securing global peace and waxing lyrical about having “standard operating procedures (SOPs) and relevant laws in Malaysia to be adhered to by everyone”, to actually have a security apparatus that actually enforces such laws, without fear or favour, instead of patrolling the Twitterverse warning Malaysians against exercising their democratic right in calling for the removal of a sitting prime minister.

Apropos everything, this is the IGP who said “I don’t have a problem if they want to ban me from Twitter. If I’m banned, there are 126,000 others who will monitor it” - which just goes to show the priorities of our police force.

This of course brings us back to the threat the IGP issued to the honourable representative from Kulai, DAP’s Teo Nie Ching (photo), “not to make statements that could create public unrest". Add to this the horse manure about dealing with a segment of society who have lost respect for the force due to “incitement by certain parties" for their personal agenda...