The courts main concern should be about upholding justice and all other concerns including those of a pressing backlog, should take back seat to this, the country's former attorney-general Abu Talib Othman said today.

"Delaying justice is injustice but hurrying justice is an equal injustice too," he told reporters attending the second day of 2004 Malaysian Human Rights Day Conference in Kuala Lumpur.

In reminding the court that their main role as in the fair and equal dispensation of justice, he said they should not be too concerned with numbers.

"The courts should make clear their findings with reasons. They should be courts of justice, not courts of statistics," said Abu Talib, who is currently the chairperson of the Human Rights Commission (Suhakam).

Abu Talib, who was attorney-general from 1980 to 1993, also took to task judges who performed well when new to their appointments but became lackadaisical after some time.

"We cannot afford to have an inefficient judiciary in this country," he said.

Extreme interpretation

Asked to comment on former deputy prime minister Anwar Ibrahim's release, Abu Talib said the judicial system in this country had never changed, the only concern being who administrated it.

"We see some judges who say something today, but say something else when they are on the bench. I have seen those with an extreme interpretation (of the law), but once they go to the bench, they take different views," he said.

Abu Talib, added that the human factor was the key element in determining the quality of the country's judicial system.

"You can't foretell what an individual will do the next day and there is no guarantee that a person would be the same after his appointment," he said.

"Every system is a good system. It is only the people that make the system bad ... it's a question of individual."

Abu Talib added that in this respect, civil society had a role to play in examining the accountability and transparency of the judicial system.