NEW Inspector-General of Police Acryl Sani Abdullah Sani could be the man to transform the Malaysian police into a world-class force if he would accept the recommendations of the Police Royal Commission, among which was to hold an inquiry into every custodial death, said DAP’s Lim Kit Siang.

“In 2005, the Police Royal Commission, headed by a former chief justice Tun Dzaiddin and the longest-serving former IGP Tun Hanif Omar, said in its report that it viewed  with ‘grave concern the unacceptable high incidence of deaths in custody and the failure by the authorities to hold inquests before magistrates in most of the cases’,” said Lim in a statement today.

“They proposed that ‘inquiries must be held by a magistrate into all cases of death in custody within one month of receiving the report of death’.”

The Iskandar Puteri MP said the recent deaths of two more people in police custody served as an urgent call for the establishment of the Independent Police Complaints and Misconduct Commission.

“Security guard S. Sivabalan and cow milk trader A. Ganapathy are not going to be the last persons to die in custody.

“This may be so, but let Sivabalan and Ganapathy not be the last persons to die in police custody without a full inquiry.

“The notion that police personnel are immune from prosecution for gross abuses of power must be banished from all police personnel, as Malaysia must be a nation where there is the rule of law,” he said..

Forty-year-old Ganapathy died on April 18 in Selayang Hospital where police had sent him for treatment.

The father of two was arrested on February 24 to assist in investigations into his brother’s alleged crimes. He is reported to have spent 12 days in police custody from February 24 to March 8 before he was admitted to the hospital.

In May, Sivabalan Subramaniam, a 43-year-old security guard, was picked up by police from his workplace in Bandar Baru Selayang in connection with an extortion case.

Gombak district police chief Arifai Tarawe said in a statement that Sivabalan was brought to the district police headquarters at 11.40am, after which he complained of breathing difficulties.

Police called for an ambulance and medical officers tried to revive Sivabalan, who was pronounced dead at 12.30pm. – May 22, 2021.