I refer to the article headlined 'Conflict of interest' poser over ex-CJ's job, and applaud in the strongest terms the principled stand taken by Malaysian Bar Council president Kuthubul Zaman Bukhari and the call by both the Bar Council and DAP chairperson Lim Kit Siang for a code of ethics.

While it will be stating the obvious that this proposed code of ethics is long overdue, what must shine through for all concerned, including all the people of Malaysia, is the importance of the concept of judicial independence within the overall schema of the 'separation of powers' that common law countries like Malaysia practise.

The umbrella schema of the 'separation of powers' is to ensure the physical and functional separation of executive, legislative and judicial powers vertically so as to prevent a situation where "power corrupts, and absolute powers corrupts absolutely" - the oft-repeated dictum of Lord Acton.

In other words, the liberty of the individual lamb against the lion of State powers will be best guaranteed only when such powers are separated by the use of power to check power. This noble objective of judicial independence is often lost to the ordinary person.

What the concept in operation means is that each of the three divisions will check the exercise of and balance the powers that each of them enjoys so that a society can derive the best ever results of enhancing individual liberty or freedom. The overall result is to arrest the natural propensity to drift towards absolutism or absolute powers that will prove detrimental to the liberty of the individual.

So, to avert absolutism and its attendant woes against personal liberty, power must be divided. In England, a unitary state, the powers of the executive, legislative and judiciary is physically and functionally divided only vertically.

However, in the United States, a federal state, power is divided vertically and even horizontally. That is why we see on television that they have the County Courts, the District Courts, and the State Supreme Courts, with the Supreme Court crowning the American legal system at the federal level.

The police forces in the United Kingdom and the United States do not enjoy the wide powers that their counterparts in Malaysia enjoy. In both these countries, the police are employed by the local councils, the state or its equivalent and then the nation, with each of them enjoying only limited powers, except the latter which has national oversight over "national" crimes.

So, as one can see, police powers are so divided to ensure, to that extent possible, the incorruptibility of the system - guaranteed, at the risk of repeating myself, by the use of power to check power.

Of course, in Malaysia, we have a national unit called the Royal Malaysian Police which was originally our response to the challenge posed by the armed insurrection of the Malayan Communist Party. And, with respect, this unhealthy concentration of power perhaps explains why police powers in Malaysia have been abused.

There is a grave need for public participation in the exercise of police powers in Malaysia. Perhaps, the government should set up a Police Complaints Authority with public participation headed by a retired High Court judge to act against any and every abuse of power.

With the sweep of democratisation throughout the world today, inaugurated by the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the implosion of the former Soviet Union in 1990, we in Malaysia must move with the times and ensure that all the institutions such as the separation of powers, judicial independence, the rule of law, and above all a free press, are in place.

The rule of law is vital for any society based on common law principles. History has proven time and again that it is better than rule by law. Imagine the severe disadvantage that a person with limited means will face in a rule by law situation when up against a person of means.

The rich person can use his wealth and connections to grease his way to suppress the legitimate rights of his poorer compatriot. Is that the society that we in Malaysia want? I think not.

A free press is vital, if only because it is the final check against any abuse of power from any quarter. A free press, besides acting as a feedback for the authorities at all levels, will be an avenue for anyone adversely affected by the implementation of government policies to ventilatetheir legitimate grievances. Once this occurs, the government can then take measures to mitigate or even redress the grievances.

What must manifest itself in such a healthy society is the evolution toward a "carin' and sharin' society" - the declared aim of the Barisan Nasional government - where life and liberty are celebrated.

Only when the powers-that-be in the Barisan Nasional understand this critical importance of celebrating life will they, and through them the bureaucracy, understand the importance of the liberty of the individual.

If the thrust of the above argument is grasped, it follows that the Internal Security Act must be repealed because it denies such a simple act of celebrating life, however ephemeral it may be, and it denies liberty.

Having said that, of course, liberty must come within the constraints of good laws in pursuit of the ideals of human justice, however imperfect they may be.

I call upon all Malaysians to summon the courage to stand up and be counted. If we fail to do that, then not only will we deserve the government we get but we will be shortchanging our children and our children's children by bequeathing to them something less than what we can actually leave them.

I end on this note: given our human ingenuity, the best code of ethics will not stop people from abusing the concept of judicial independence and its concomitant assault on our individual liberty.

Only a free and lively press can do that. Dare our journalists in Malaysia rise to the hour?