TOO much time has passed for the Malaysian Human Rights Commission (Suhakam) to hold a public hearing into the disappearance of pastor Joshua Hilmy and his wife, Ruth, said a close friend who first raised the alarm on the missing couple.

Insurance salesman Peter Pormannan, who has known the couple since 2012, was the first to lodge a police report when they went missing in 2017.

Last week, Suhakam announced it will conduct a public inquiry into the missing couple next month.

But Peter, 57, is sceptical that anything substantial will come out of the inquiry.

“They just disappeared without a trace. Despite lodging a police report and with no information, it’s going to be a difficult to locate them as there are no witnesses or links to their whereabouts,” Peter told The Malaysian Insight.

Suhakam said the inquiry will be held on February 18 but Peter said, as the couple’s friend and despite him lodging the first police report, he has not been summoned to give evidence.

“It is going to be difficult for them (Suhakam) but I hope they can unravel this mystery. He (Joshua) sometimes travelled outstation but he always kept in touch.

“But after not hearing from him for months, I lodged a police report on March 6, 2017.

“There is a possibility that something could have happened to the couple. Maybe there were some people who were not happy with his alleged proselytising? I don’t know.”

Despite his misgivings, Peter said he hopes the inquiry can shed some light on what happened to the couple and provide closure on the case.

Joshua, a Malay-Muslim who converted to Christianity, and Ruth, whose maiden name is Sitepu, were last seen on November 30, 2016.

Very little was known about the couple until a police report was lodged by Ruth’s brother, Iman Setiawan Sitepu, and sister, Ram Ram Elisabeth, in 2018.

Ruth’s family lived in the fishing village of Nambiki in northern Sumatra, Indonesia. While the family were made aware of her disappearance in March 2017, they could not come to Malaysia because of financial constraints.

They last spoke to her in November 2016.

They told Suhakam that she sounded cheerful then and raised no issues, adding that she used to call the family twice a month.

Iman said Ruth came to Malaysia in 2000 and began working at a tailor’s shop in Ipoh, Perak. She met Joshua in 2004 and they married in 2006. They then returned to Indonesia to meet her family.

He added that the couple then returned to Malaysia before heading back to Nambiki in 2007, when they started a fish farm. They were there up to 2009 before returning to Malaysia.

They returned to Indonesia that same year for Ruth’s father’s funeral, which was the last time the family saw them, but they remained in contact.

Suhakam said the inquiry panel will be chaired by commissioner Hishamuddin Yunus and assisted by commissioners Jerald Joseph and Madeline Berma.

It urged those with information on the couple to come forward and record their statements.

This will be the third inquiry conducted Suhakam into missing persons, following inquiries into missing pastor Raymond Koh and Perlis Hope founder Amri Che Mat in 2018. The inquiry concluded that they were cases of “enforced disappearances”.

In Koh and Amri’s cases, the Suhakam panel was unanimous in finding that Special Branch personnel from the federal police headquarters abducted the duo in commando-style operations.

Amri was abducted on November 24, 2016. It was revealed during the inquiry that he was, at the time, under police surveillance for alleged Shia activities.

Koh was snatched on February 13, 2017. A police report was lodged against him months later for allegedly proselytising to youth. – January 29, 2020.