COMMENT | 'I beg your pardon': Malaysia's RM50m get-out-of-jail pass

COMMENT | A few weeks ago, I was invited to speak to the Institute of Corporate Directors Malaysia (ICDM) about my latest book, “Understanding China: Governance, Socio-Economics, Global Influence”.

In explaining China’s ascendancy in the last decade, I said that in addition to investments in infrastructure, technology and a focus on communitarian development, a key factor was the hard-nosed fight against corruption, which included the state empowering the public to report on corrupt officials even via WeChat.

I also pointed out that the punishment was most severe for senior officials, especially ministers, and that it includes the death penalty.

During the Q&A, I was asked a question about what lessons Malaysia could learn from China. I said there are many, but we are unlikely to learn them given our dysfunctional and rent-seeking political system. I added that if there is one that we should focus on, it would be to get tough on corruption, especially with senior officials. I refrained from advocating capital punishment.

There was, as is common in Malaysia, a hush amongst elites when one openly addresses what so many say aloud in private. I have lost count of the number of taxi drivers from the airport who are victims of the scam system operating there and who have asked me about Chinese methods to fight corruption.

When informed, they tell me they would like to see these same harsh methods used in Malaysia.

In answering the question at the talk, I said these measures would dramatically change the fortunes of the country, and this is obvious if we look at the results in Singapore, where per capita GDP is more than six times ours. Yes, Singapore is small and may not be the best comparison, but our per capita GDP is roughly level with China’s, a country of 1.4 billion people.

If we had the same tough stance, I believe our GDP might well double, and there would be scores in jail for white-collar crime, especially politicians and people from within the government. Few, if any, discharges not amounting to an acquittal (DNAAs) would be issued.

Coincidentally, I also found myself last week speaking to two groups of foreigners, mostly Europeans, and I said that the tough anti-corruption stance in China was a major factor in its ascendancy. I also mentioned Singapore and its former prime minister Lee Kuan Yew’s tough position from the early days. In this video, he recounts how a minister under investigation for corruption took his own life.

In Korea and Japan, many politicians and business leaders resigned or even took their own lives when exposed, given the shame they felt they brought on the nation and their families. It is an expectation of the society. It has cultural roots which seem to be totally absent amongst our political elite.

The reasons for this will make for very uncomfortable reading for our elite political leaders. A respected Malay Islamic scholar, M Kamal Hassan, sets them out in “Corruption and Hypocrisy in Malay Muslim Politics: The Urgency of Moral-Ethical Transformation”, which argues that Malay political culture itself has become corrupt.

Business as usual

Recent events have done little to reassure us. We all read the news about three former PMs (below) being at the same court complex on the same day, each over a corruption-linked case, a world first.

The jailed former prime minister himself has no shame and has shown no genuine remorse: his one apology, in 2024, came with a denial that he took any of the money. He is emboldened by his misguided political flock and former allies, be they other ministers, political or business leaders.

Even race and religion are used shamelessly to make the case for innocence, with people praying for him to be freed. The politicians mislead their rural base as they continue to shamelessly plead to the faithful that their former leader is innocent despite the evidence and the courts convicting him. Pictures of the seized cash and handbags are not enough proof of how venal these people are. They display no shred of shame.

The public, after a while, becomes inured and is no longer outraged, as it comes to see this as normal, and the looters view it as their entitlement and wonder why all the fuss. After all, it is why they seek office, and it is business as usual.

To this we need to add the special role the Attorney-General’s Chambers plays - depending on who is the prime minister and the deputy - in shaping pardons, DNAAs and other goodies, according to who at any time is pulling the levers in the mysterious political games being played behind closed doors of which the public has no knowledge.

The prosecutor who sought the DNAA on the DPM’s 47 charges in 2023 is now the attorney-general sitting on the Pardons Board. Rather than being independent, the AG’s office is used as a tool for pushing political interests, no different from the criminality of the current US regime.

Many experts have now commented on the constitutionally inaccurate explanation used by the Prime Minister’s Office and Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department (Federal Territories) Hannah Yeoh: that it was the king’s decision.

Article 42 provides that the king acts on the advice of the Pardons Board, which must first consider the AG’s written opinion, and whose members include the AG and the federal territories minister herself. Interpretation of the Constitution on this issue has now become political theatre.

The less said about the little-known other members of the Pardons Board, the better. It is even more mysterious in its workings than the ultra-conservative Supreme Court in the US. The government’s approach to appeals for transparency, explanation and the release of the AG’s written opinion is a silent “I beg your pardon?” – that is, “How dare you ask?”

To understand how deep the rot is, just consider that the current government got elected on a strong anti-corruption agenda. Yeoh (below) was, not so long ago, a senior figure in the party that campaigned hardest on 1MDB.

Calling us a banana republic is maybe too generous a term. We are more like "cacing sawah" (earthworm) - with abundant kangkung for the rakyat grown in nutrient-rich sewage swamps owned by the state.

Najib's house arrest

But let’s focus on the big condition cited in the pardon: Pay RM50 million and get out of jail and go home. Sounds like a game of Monopoly, and as we all know, the outcome depends on who holds the chips.

Immediately after the news of the pardon, the deputy prime minister, as Umno president, said he would lead the charge to raise the money for his former boss. There was no reprimand from the PMO or any other institution with oversight responsibilities despite the sensitivities.

The government just fell in line, attempting to give legitimacy to the process and further reinforcing the public view that there are no checks and balances. They acted like guardians of a feudal state.

Here are a few questions which require answers and could perhaps serve as ammunition for those who care and dare to push for full disclosure so that our slide into the swamp is checked.

• So does the pardon come into effect after the RM50 million is paid? What is the grace period? Is it two or three weeks, or open-ended? These are important details given that the house is already being prepared by the law agencies.

• Is it true, according to some reports, that the house arrest has been approved and non-payment of the fine only increases the sentence by one year?

• Can funds be raised from the public for this purpose, or is it meant to be paid only by the felon and his family?

• As the felon's assets and accounts have been frozen - given that it must be assumed much was acquired through fraud - will these be defrosted so he can raise the money? Surely not, but who knows now that the law is proving to be an ass. Which institution is responsible for this matter of law and for providing a clarification?

• What happens to the judgment by Alice Loke, which G25 reads as finding that there is no legal framework for home arrest? Do remember many Malaysians welcomed this decision.

• Moreover, is it even legal to raise funds for a felon's freedom from jail? After all, the conviction has not been overturned. Lawyers out there, please figure this out. Can an injunction be sought to stop the fundraising?

• Which entity is raising the money? Is it legally allowed to do so and to collect money from gullible people who are being politically manipulated? Is that in itself a form of fraud? Would Islamic principles allow this? Can the religious authorities provide an opinion?

• Does the entity raising money (assuming it is legal) have an obligation to disclose the names of all donors? Do its articles of association even allow it to do so? Who is checking?

• What if bad actors or even foreign agents try to contribute to this fund and thereby seek to influence politics in Malaysia? Don’t rule this out.

• Which institution of the state will be responsible for overseeing and monitoring this fundraising, given that it provides real opportunities for defrauding innocent people? After all, this is not a simple matter of a village raising funds for the "penghulu" (village head) to hire a lawyer to fight his court case about who stole the durians.
  
  And we all know that Malaysian leaders entrusted with the money of the people are world-class when it comes to siphoning other people's money - Tabung Haji, anyone? Will anyone go to jail?

• What if cronies who have benefited from the 1MDB scandal are chipping in funds with some loose change from the loot to free their “Bossku”? It would be a case of illicit money being used to free from jail the felon responsible for the “original sin” – 1MDB itself.

• And will the banks play ball in handling this money? Will they risk laundering this money or come clean and ensure full disclosure? Who will audit the sources of the money raised? Hopefully not one of the Big Four implicated in 1MDB.

These questions are but the tip of the iceberg in terms of making sense of issues now at stake, rather than simply executing the ill-thought-through arrangement. One would have thought that these serious challenges would have been thought through before those advising on the pardon settled so easily on the payment of a "political bribe masquerading as a penalty" – a fine the Pardons Board had already cut from RM210 million in 2024. One felon, two pardons.

But then again, if the political system has now taken over the legal system, then as we all know, the former does what it has always done: run roughshod over the legal system and spit at the public in the process.

It is time the rakyat spit back.

CHANDRAN NAIR is the founder and CEO of the Global Institute For Tomorrow, a pan-Asian Reinvention Advisory Firm. His books include Understanding China: Governance, Socio-Economics, Global Influence, The Sustainable State, Dismantling Global White Privilege and Consumptionomics: Asia’s Role in Reshaping Capitalism and Saving the Planet.

The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of Malaysiakini.

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