THREE weeks before the task force on the missing activists was announced, the family of Amri Che Mat sent Putrajaya a letter of demand, seeking monetary compensation for the inaction of the police and for the ordeal the family was put through.

Amri was the founder of Perlis Hope, a civil society group which aided the poor. He was abducted in 2016 near his house in Perlis.

His wife, Norhayati Mohd Ariffin, told The Malaysian Insight the letter of demand was sent on May 31. Putrajaya never responded despite being given two weeks to do so.

“We have not decided on our next course of action,” she told The Malaysian Insight when asked if the family would take the government to court.

“However, I am disappointed that the government has ignored our letter.

“On top of that, the whole task force issue goes to show that the government is not interested in helping us uncover the truth and get justice for Amri and Raymond (Koh),” she said.

She was referring to the composition of the task force, half of whom are members of the police force, including one officer who represented the police at the Human Rights Commission’s (Suhakam) public inquiry.

This drew the ire of the families of Amri and Koh and civil society groups.

Yesterday, however, the officer concerned, former police legal affairs chief Mokhtar Mohd Nor withdrew from the task force.

The Home Ministry had said in a statement that Mokhtar’s withdrawal followed a public outcry over the composition of the panel.

The Suhakam public inquiry laid the blame on the Special Branch at the federal police headquarters in Bukit Aman, for the disappearance of the two activists.

Norhayati’s family lawyer Surendra Ananth said the demand is in relation to the losses suffered by the family in the past two and a half years due to failure of the police to investigate the case.

“The demand is essentially confined to the losses the family has suffered due to the police’s failure to investigate the matter over the past two and a half years. 

“This is a breach of the family’s constitutional right. The police have the legal duty to effectively investigate criminal complaints,” Surendra told The Malaysian Insight.

On the amount of compensation sought, Surendra said the government was given the option to make a suggestion.

“We had invited the government to suggest an amount.”

The letter was sent to the Attorney-General’s Chambers in their capacity as the lawyers for the government and copied to the police.

Commenting on the composition of the task force, Surendra said it is important to have enforcement personnel that have the power to investigate on board.

“It is important that the task force has the power to investigate effectively. For that purpose, there has to be a strong police presence.

“This could be in the form of someone from the MACC (Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission ) or PDRM (Royal Malaysian Police).

“This would enable the taskforce to call in persons for questioning and make arrests when necessary,” he told The Malaysian Insight.

Surendra said that it will be good to have a representative from the Attorney-General’s Chambers on the panel as well as it would facilitate prosecution if there is a need.

“This to me is what should happen. Instead, what seems to be happening is a review of Suhakam’s findings,” he said.

He added that the task force should act on the findings and work towards bringing the perpetrators to the book, instead of reviewing Suhakam’s work. – July 3, 2019.