A senior lawyer recounted how his client Munawar Aness, who was Anwar Ibrahim's former speechwriter, was allegedly tortured and forced to confess to having sex against the order of nature.

Testifying at the Kuala Lumpur High Court today, Manjeet Singh Dhillion said Munawar is still traumatised by the experience.

Manjeet (photo), 74, who was called as Anwar's witness in his defamation suit against Youth and Sports Minister Khairy Jamaluddin Abu Bakar, testified that he recorded what Munawar said after visiting him about eight times in prison.

The statements became part of a statutory declaration which Munawar signed in 1998, added the former Malaysian Bar president.

“Munawar is my client and he wanted his trauma recorded. His narration of events began from the point of his arrest on Sept 14, 1998, and continued in great depths and detail over what was done to him night and day during the interrogation by the police, right up to the point where he was taken to court and forced to plead guilty.

“I wrote down everything he said. His recollection of events was clear, comprehensive and precise. Wherever possible he named names, identified events and acts he was forced to perform. He wanted to place before the court his torture, abuse and humiliation by his interrogators,” said Manjeet.

In a witness statement tendered in court, he said Munawar described how he was allegedly shaved bald, stripped of his identity, and then systematically humiliated, brainwashed, interrogated, drugged and tortured into making a false confession.

“Munawar detailed every step and move by the special branch and police officers and even identified the officers involved,” he added.

Munawar pleaded guilty in court under Section 377D for an offence against the order of nature with Anwar and was sentenced to six months jail.

He wanted to appeal against the conviction and sentence, and hence made the statutory declaration which was tendered in court today, marked only as an identification following objections by Khairy's counsel Muhammad Shafee Abdullah.

Anwar's lawyers, Sivarasa Rasiah, J Leela and Shahid Adli Kamarudin, and Shafee would later submit on the admissibility of the statutory declaration to be marked as evidence.

Manjeet also testified that the process of making Munawar's statutory declaration took many sessions, as after each session he would return to his office and type the day's narration of events and on the following visit the speechwriter would read the previous typed narration and continue on.

“This resulted in the 55-page statutory declaration which was only completed towards the end of 1998. The SD was typed and shown to Munawar and he read and confirmed the events,” he said, adding that Munawar is a brilliant person who has a photographic memory.

Munawar now lives in Pakistan

Manjeet said Munawar's wife Fatima Belhadi met him and another lawyer Balwant Singh, and retained them to act for Munawar.

He added that he met Munawar the first time at Ward 29 of the Kuala Lumpur Hospital on Sept 24, 1998, and was given instructions to file an appeal to the High Court against his conviction and sentence.

He added that following this, one inspector Rajakopal and lawyer Yacob Karim (who appeared for Munawar when he was charged), visited Munawar at the hospital to dissuade him from appealing.

Manjeet said he tried to clear Munawar's conviction and sentence in the Court of Appeal and Federal Court.

“I fought for this man's freedom since 1998, for 10 or 11 years, and given the chance I would do it all over again (for Munawar),” he said.

The senior lawyer said Munawar now lives in Lahore, Pakistan and a broken man due to the after effects of the 1998 incident.

The lawyer said he also keeps in touch with Munawar but the speechwriter has been advised not to travel abroad.

“The man is absolutely traumatised, his family had split, his children are not with him and he is alone and do not have an income,” he said.

During cross-examination, Manjeet agreed with Shafee that he could not produce any medical evidence to show Munawar's condition.

The lawyer added that he was an eyewitness to the event and based on experience, his evaluation showed what Munawar had narrated was the truth.

Replying to further questions by Shafee, Manjeet said he had no ulterior motives to testify in this court, travelling from the United Kingdom to do so.

Outside the courtroom, Sivarasa explained to reporters that Manjeet was called as Anwar's witness due to Khairy's defence of justification.

Sivarasa said Khairy's alleged remark of "main belakang" (play from behind), which is the subject of this suit, may refer to Anwar as being a homosexual, and Anwar wanted to rebut that with Munawar.

“Since Munawar cannot come, Manjeet has agreed and we are using Section 73 of the Evidence Act to try and admit the statutory declaration (as evidence),” he said.

The hearing continues before Justice Azizul Azmi Adnan on Feb 20.

A chilling statutory declaration