Dear Tun Dr. Mahathir,

Tun's following statements are referred:
"6. Were the judges sacked or suspended? I think they were sacked. The records say so. Now the Minister says "No", the judges were not sacked or suspended.

7. Why pay them compensation if they are not sacked or suspended and they did not even lose their pension rights?"

If the judges were sacked or suspended, there must be a legitimate reason for the Government to do so. It seemed that the current de facto Law Minister could not find a good and strong reason to claim that the judges were sacked since the later had been granted by the ex-de facto Law Minister huge sums of ex-gratia payment. Even if the judges were suspended pending for domestic inquiry, the law required that the suspension and the domestic inquiry process ought not exceed a certain reasonable period of time. It would be ridiculous for the current de facto Law Minister to say that the judges were suspended for such a long period of time, i.e. about twenty years.

If the Government's records really show that the judges were sacked, the current Government might risk the danger of being filed a lawsuit for wrongful dismissal because there was no hard evidence to prove that the judges did commit certain criminal offence or did conduct any act of improprietary in accordance with the Ethical Codes of the servicing judges. I guess it is much wiser for the current de facto Law Minister to say "No, the judges were not sacked or suspended." since the records-keeping could have been already messed up or adulterated by now and no records could be located to prove that the judges were being rightfully sacked or suspended.

"Why pay them compensation if they (the judges) are not sacked or suspended and they did not even lose their pension rights?" I don't think ex-gratia payments should be classified as an illegitimate or unnecessary compensation since the ex-gratia payments were made in good faith as a token of appreciation to the ex judges who had been either wrongfully terminated or wrongfully suspended by the Government during the reign of Tun as the Prime Minister. The principles of Natural Justice make the majority Malaysians feel that Tun was wrong in the behaviour of terminating those judges through the working mechanism of a tribunal proceeding because Tun as the responsible Prime Minister at that point of time chose not to disclose on time to the public the true reason for terminating the judges. I believe not only the judges themselves have the rights to be informed on time about the reason of they themselves being terminated from the service as a judge but the public of Malaysia also have the rights to obtain the timely information on the reason why such a drastic action had been taken against those judges during a time of intense political power struggle in Umno about 20 years ago. Apparently, Tun is deemed to have substantially indulged in the conflict of interest by causing the judges to be terminated since those judges were perceived to be your political foes.

Tun, I wish to advise that the time has changed and majority Malaysians have higher democratic aspiration now than 20 years' ago. If Najib is going to become the next Prime Minister of Malaysia, the majority Malaysians will expect him not to follow your bad precedence in meddling with the judicial independence. Therefore, it is much better for Tun to leave the judiciary branch of the Government alone and not to intervene too much in the appointment of judges in the future. A proper checks-and-balances system would require that the appointment of the judges should be based on the recommendation of a Judges Appointment Committee and should be subjected to the final approval by the Conference of the Malay Rulers. The present political reality in Malaysia will no longer allow too much power to be vested in the hand of only one person, i.e. the Prime Minister, lest the Prime Minister will be turned into a violent tyrant or corrupt dictator if given too much uncontrollable political power.

Tun, for the sake of our future generations will you please learn to adjust your own tyrannic mindset now since you are no longer the Prime Minister of Malaysia?

Onlooker