COMMENT The Malaysian Bar is perturbed by the baseless and absurd allegation made by the Umno vice-president and Deputy Prime Minister, Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, in his speech at the closing of the 70th Umno general assembly on Dec 3, 2016, that the Bar Council has been been influenced (‘diresapi’) by the idea of the ‘Colour Movement’.

He was apparently referring to ‘Colour Revolutions’, which is widely used to refer to non-violent revolutionary movements to overthrow elected governments, thus implying that the Bar Council is involved in such a movement to topple the Malaysian government.

He further announced that a task force - comprising the Royal Malaysian Police, the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission, the Central Bank of Malaysia, and the Attorney General’s Chambers - has been set up to monitor and investigate the matter.

The Malaysian Bar categorically refutes this preposterous allegation made against the Bar Council. It is wholly unfounded, and maligns the Bar Council without a shred of evidence. The underlying motive appears to be to smear and vilify the Bar Council as well as to divert attention from other serious concerns that plague the government.

It is therefore a waste of valuable resources to require any task force to look into this groundless allegation against the Bar Council. Further, it would be reprehensible if the task force is used as a device to intimidate and undermine the Bar Council.

Instead of indulging in diversions, the government should focus its efforts on detecting, apprehending and prosecuting all wrongdoers in the spiralling allegations of financial improprieties involving 1Malaysia Development Berhad (‘1MDB’).

There is little or no information on the purported continuing police investigations into these allegations, which lends to the public perception that the investigations will not expose or reveal the culprits who should be prosecuted. It is indeed unsettling that no one has yet been prosecuted in Malaysia for any of these allegations.

Moreover, the ongoing investigations (as well as prosecutions) - in jurisdictions such as Singapore, Switzerland and the United States of America - into various criminal allegations in relation to monies belonging to 1MDB are disconcerting, and have cast Malaysia in an unfavourable light globally.

It is alarming that the attitude of our authorities towards these grave allegations appears to be one of indifference, which has fuelled widespread concerns of complicity with the wrongdoers.