A former detainee of an illegal immigrants camp told the Magistrate Court today that he had to strip off in front of other inmates despite being an imam in the camp six years ago.

Abdul Alim told magistrate Juliana Mohamed that he suffered emotional pain, and had refused to continue leading prayers in the Machap Umbu camp in Melaka after the incident.

He said he and other inmates were told to strip naked as a punishment meted out by the police.

"After this incident I had refused to remain as an imam because I felt that I had been shamed and had lost my self-respect.

"However, the other inmates kept saying that they were all stripped together with me and I should not put any connection between the incident and prayers. I then led the Zohor prayers with a lot of emotional pain," he said, speaking through an interpreter.

Abdul Alim added that after the prayers, he recited some doa together with the other inmates, and asked for forgiveness.

The 32-year-old Bangladeshi defence witness was testifying in the 'false news' trial of Tenaganita director Irene Fernandez.

False news

Fernandez is being charged with 'maliciously publishing false news' by releasing a memorandum at a press conference in August 1995 on torture and deaths at illegal immigrant detention camps.

The women's rights activist and Keadilan supreme council member faces up to three years in prison if convicted. She is currently out on bail.

Abdul Alim recalled that he and a group of other inmates had gathered around a fellow Bangladeshi who had just received a letter from home prior to the incident which took place at noon one day.

"At that time, we were ordered by a policeman to go down to the ground floor. But due to a slight delay, the police started kicking us randomly. The recipient of the letter was continuously slapped until he was bleeding all over his face.

"Then a policeman took off his belt and asked us to remove our shirts. He ordered us to stretch our hands forward. He folded his belt into two and started hitting our palms one after another," Abdul Alim said.

He added that they were then asked to remove their sarong but he refused.

"I told the policeman that I was an imam and I did not want to be naked. But he ordered me to strip or I would be severely beaten.

"When the policeman raised his belt to hit me, the person standing next to me begged me to take off my sarong . I took it off and some of us started crying. We did not look at each other and made our minds blank," Abdul Alim said.

Another punishment

He also recounted another punishment he had to endure during his detention.

"I was asked to hang onto a wire fence with my hands outstretched for 15 minutes on a hot afternoon. My toes held on to the fence as well.

"My palms became sore and there were blood clots. The pain was unbearable as the fence was also quite hot. My soles became completely red and I was sweating from pain," he said.

Abdul Alim added that he had problems doing his regular chores with his hands after the incident.

He had to sit on the floor as his legs also constantly gave way, he added.

Asked by defence counsel M Puravalen if he had witnessed any other forms of punishment against other detainees during his six-month detention in the camp, Abdul Alim said, yes.

He recalled that an inmate who had lost his calling card in the camp, was forced to swallow small pieces of another card.

"He was called down to the office and stripped naked. He was slowly fed a whole card, piece by piece. Then his prayer cap was taken off and he was ordered to lie down in the sun and stare at it directly for one and a half hours.

"He was asked to point his legs towards the direction of the Muslim prayer. I felt very sad and disappointed as he was a Muslim and the policeman was a Malay," Abdul Alim said, adding that he saw the incident from his cell.

Abdul Alim also testified that he suffered sores on his skin which were sometimes filled with blood and pus during his stay in the camp from February to July 1995.

"My genitals were the worst affected. I had problem wearing clothes because it was difficult to scratch over the clothing. I received medicine only after 20 days but they did not heal completely," he said.

He added that he also suffered a severe toothache one night in the camp but was denied medication.

"The pain was unbearable and when I informed a policeman, he told me to wait. The pain increased gradually and I could not eat any food. I was also unable to pray the whole day.

"I screamed in pain at night and a policeman came and kicked me. He told me to shut up but the pain was too much that I still made some sound," he said, adding that he was only taken to the hospital the next day.

No windows

Abdul Alim told the court that he was housed in a block with 600 to 700 inmates on each floor.

There was never enough room to sleep on the floor, and the block was filled with mosquitoes and other insects, he said.

He added that the block had no windows and the door was always kept shut.

"There was no ventilation and air circulation. It was generally very warm," he said.

He also said that the inmates had to share 10 toilets in the block which were constantly filled with human waste.

"There was no water in the toilet. We only had water outside the block from 4am to 7am every day. We used to store some water to go to the toilet.

"The smell was unbearable. I put my hand on my nose and held my breath. When I went inside, I would look upward and forward. I felt like vomiting when I came outside," he said.

Asked about the food in the camp, Abdul Alim said he was only served seven to eight pieces of ikan bilis (anchovies) with two palmfuls of white rice and some leafy vegetables for lunch and dinner every day.

"Sometimes they would give us a boiled egg but they never gave the fish and egg together. For breakfast, we got four biscuits and a cup of tea. The tea was warm and bitter.

"The food was never enough and it did not taste good, but we had no choice. They never gave us any other meat," he said.

The hearing is scheduled to continue tomorrow morning.

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