HOW can a cop afford watches worth RM400k?

The question was asked by Kepong MP Lim Lip Eng after a 41-year-old housewife was charged at the Magistrate’s Court in Ipoh with stealing her police officer husband’s luxury Rolex watches three years ago.

According to the charge sheet, she was charged with stealing a Rolex Sky-Dweller (Model 326135) and Rolex GMT Master-II 9 (Model 116718 LN) said to be worth RM207,000 and RM198,000 respectively.

If her police officer husband can’t explain how he could afford the luxury watches, then he would have what is called “unexplained wealth”. In January last year, I explained what the term means.

Lim’s query came in the wake of Bukit Aman’s Criminal Investigation Department director Shuhaily Zain asking how a sergeant was able to afford luxury marques such as Toyota Alphard, Toyota Vellfire, and Mercedes-Benz.

He wondered whether their superiors ever questioned how their subordinates could afford such luxury vehicles or required them to declare their assets.

Shuhaily need not have wondered so if we have legislation adopting Article 20 of the United Nations Convention Against Corruption 2003, which states as follows:

“Subject to its constitution and the fundamental principles of its legal system, each State Party shall consider adopting such legislative and other measures as may be necessary to establish as a criminal offence, when committed intentionally, illicit enrichment, that is, a significant increase in the assets of a public official that he or she cannot reasonably explain in relation to his or her lawful income.”

Such legislation would have introduced measures that include what is called unexplained wealth orders (UWOs). A UWO places the burden on the individual, rather than the authority, to prove how he or she has accumulated his or her wealth. He or she is to produce evidence to verify the sources of the wealth, failing which the property may be recoverable by civil forfeiture.

Will the unity government now legislate, or at least consider legislating, to provide for measures like UWOs?

It should if it is to send a clear message that it is determined to require officials and individuals in positions of power and influence to explain assets belonging to them that are clearly incommensurate with their publicly declared earnings or known business interests. – October 15, 2023.

* Hafiz Hassan reads The Malaysian Insight.