Malaysia's Anwar doesn't expect sodomy conviction

Associated Press First Posted 15:11:00 01/30/2010

MANILA, Philippines—Malaysian opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim said Saturday he does not expect to be convicted on charges he sodomized a male former aide.

"The medical records are in our favor," he told reporters in Manila after meeting with former president Joseph Estrada. "If they (prosecutors) go by the law, there would be no conviction."

Malaysia's Federal Court on Friday upheld a lower court's ruling that the prosecution does not need to provide Anwar with medical reports, camera recordings and other evidence ahead of his trial for alleged sodomy—a crime in the Muslim-majority country that carries a jail sentence of up to 20 years.

The former deputy prime minister was charged with corruption and sodomizing his former family driver in 1998. He was convicted and imprisoned but released in 2004 after the Federal Court overturned the sodomy conviction.

Anwar says those charges were meant to prevent him from challenging then Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad.

He said the new charges are part of a political conspiracy to undermine his three-party opposition alliance. Malaysian officials have denied plotting against him.

Anwar, a friend of Estrada and late president Corazon Aquino, was invited by the University of the Philippines College of Law to deliver a lecture on democracy.

Source:Inquirer Global Nation

Anwar meets with Aquino, Estrada

Hantu Laut

In desperate need of foreign support against his second sodomy trail Anwar Ibrahim has gone to meet some old friends.

Meanwhile, Amnesty International wants the sodomy charges against Anwar to be dropped.

“The Malaysian authorities have resorted to the same old dirty tricks in an attempt to remove the opposition leader from politics,” said Sam Zarifi, the Asia-Pacific director of Amnesty International in a statement.

“Malaysia’s judiciary should throw out these charges," he added.

Same old conspiracy theory sold by Anwar.

Anwar meets with Aquino, Estrada

By Norman Bordadora
Philippine Daily Inquirer First Posted 13:56:00 01/30/2010

MANILA, Philippines—(UPDATE) A light moment over brunch showed how the friendship between deposed President Joseph Estrada and former Malaysian Deputy Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim has evolved through the years despite the distance between Manila and Kuala Lumpur and the jails that once kept each of them from the rest of the world.

Estrada and Ibrahim, who are again opposition leaders in their respective countries after serving time for what both describe as politically motivated cases, compared the length of their respective jail terms as close friends listened and laughed.

“How long did you stay in jail?” Estrada asked Ibrahim, according to the former president’s spokesperson Margaux Salcedo, who was also at the table.

Ibrahim said, “Six years.”

Not to be outdone, Estrada shot back, “I was in jail for six and half years.”

Estrada, nonetheless, said that one other person beat both of them by another six months.

“Ninoy Aquino was detained for seven years,” Salcedo quoted Estrada as saying.

Estrada and Ibrahim had a late breakfast of fried milkfish, fried eggs and fried rice at the Manila Polo Club on Saturday.

When they met members of the media as they wound up the meeting, the good-natured exchange continued almost without regard for formalities between one former head of state and an incumbent member of the Malaysian parliament.

“He knows more about Rizal than [I do],” Estrada said by way of explaining why he admired Ibrahim and how their friendship lasted through the years and even after both of them were incarcerated.

“I admire him because he’s so honest,” Ibrahim said with a laugh.

Ibrahim was first to go to jail on corruption and sodomy charges in April 1999. Two years later Estrada was ousted in a popular uprising that followed a failed impeachment trial.

Police arrested Estrada in 2001 on plunder charges and he stayed in various places of detention, including his out-of-town villa east of Metro Manila until he was convicted and pardoned in 2007.

A federal court overturned Ibrahim’s conviction in 2004 but a ban on his return to politics was upheld. After the prohibition lapsed, Ibrahim won a landslide victory and reclaimed a seat in the Malaysian parliament in 2008.

Estrada, on the other hand, has just been given by the Commission on Elections the go-signal to again run for President in the elections in May.

Estrada expressed concern that Ibrahim could again be facing “politically motivated cases” because of his popularity among the masses—something that he can easily identify with.

The former President has repeatedly blamed the country’s elite for his ouster in 2001. He has styled himself as the champion of the masses and was elected in 1998 on a pro-poor platform.

“[Maybe] this is my final overseas trip to meet my friends,” Ibrahim said.

The Malaysian opposition leader will face the court for another sodomy charge this week.

“I have not had a fair trial,” Ibrahim said, adding that when a judge practiced fairness in his case, she was promptly replaced.

The night before, Ibrahim said, the son of the martyred former senator and former President Corazon Aquino, presidential candidate Sen. Benigno Aquino III, dropped by at the New World Hotel were the Malaysian opposition leader stayed.

“They’re two family friends,” Ibrahim told reporters, referring to Estrada and the young Aquino.

“They treat me as a family member,” he added.

Ibrahim said his previous visit was quite memorable as Estrada hosted a dinner that former President Aquino attended despite her ailment.

“President Cory was then very ill but she was there. It was very memorable for me, [my wife] Aziza and the family,” Ibrahim said.

Ibrahim didn’t comment on who he would want to win in the next elections, Estrada or Noynoy Aquino. They’re both his friends, he said.

Estrada gave the comment that would remind one of his days in show business.

“He’s a friend of the Aquinos. He’s a friend of Erap. Let’s not put politics in it,” Estrada told reporters. Read more.

Anwar Gears Up for Make-or-Break Sodomy Trial

By Baradan Kuppusamy

KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 27, 2010 (IPS) - Reformist leader Anwar Ibrahim, 63, who has been inflicted with various harms in his four-decade-old campaign to build ‘a just, prosperous and democratic Malaysia’, is facing probably the final battle of his epic career.

On Feb. 2 Anwar will stand trial for allegedly sodomising his political aide Saiful Bukhari, 26, a charge he said was trumped up to foil his plans to mobilise the people and seize state power in the next general election.

"They want to derail my plans to become prime minister, to rewrite the history of this country, to end the injustices and violence against the people," Anwar told IPS on the sidelines of a rally outside the capital.

"I am facing a horrendous ordeal…. It’s all politics, a conspiracy to derail the reformation of society," he said as scores of supporters mobbed and hugged him.

Anwar is attracting thousands of people to his rallies across the country ahead of the trial that political analysts say can "make or break" his political career.

"The trial can adversely impact his political career and that of the Pakatan Rakyat coalition that he leads and even the reformation struggle he has led for so long," said Dr Sivamurugan Pandyan, a political scientist with the University Science Malaysia.

"It all depends on what happens at the trial and how the case is handled," he said, adding that the 1999 sodomy trial was a public relations disaster, with many people rejecting the guilty verdict that the court handed down.

In 1998 Anwar figured in a political power struggle with then strongman Dr Mahathir Mohamad for control of the country and the direction it should take.

The 1997 Asian financial crisis was the backdrop of their power struggle and Anwar was sacked as the economy shrank and the Malaysian currency, the ringgit, plummeted.

Mahathir declared Anwar was unfit to be a leader because of alleged "homosexual tendencies" and promptly sacked him as deputy Prime Minister, removed him as finance minister and later had him arrested under the security laws that allowed for detention without trial. Subsequently, Anwar was charged with corruption and sodomy and convicted to a total of 15 years in jail.

The trial was universally rejected as biased. Anwar then launched a political party, ‘Parti Keadilan Rakyat’ (People’s Justice Party), and a reformation movement from inside the jail.

He spent six years in prison and was released after the country’s Federal Court, the highest court in the multi-racial South-east Asian country, held that he was innocent and acquitted and freed him of the sodomy charges.

In 2008 Anwar put together a coalition of dissimilar political parties – his own PKR, the Chinese-majority secular Democratic Action Party and the Pan-Malaysian Islamic party – into the formidable Pakatan Rakyat coalition and rode to sterling victory, seizing five states and ending the two-thirds majority in parliament that the ruling Barisan National’s had enjoyed for half a century.

That victory brought him one step closer to Putra Jaya, the purpose-built political capital of the country. In March 2008 shock waves hit the country after Anwar was arrested, questioned and subsequently charged with sodomy against his aide, setting the stage for the Feb. 2 showdown.

Under Malaysian laws, sodomy is punished with 20 years in prison. If Anwar is found guilty and jailed, the resulting setback would seriously damage an otherwise impressive comeback and his unremitting ambition to be Prime Minister of the country and pursue his reform agenda.

But notwithstanding the trial, the country is gradually changing under the leadership of Prime Minister Najib Razak, who, in the view of many people, has by most counts done an admirable job in a short time since taking over the country in April 2000.

"He has co-opted the change agenda from the Pakatan…. He is making the changes that the country needs and he is gaining political mileage with his reform agenda," said Dr Denison Jayasooria, a political scientist with the National University of Malaysia.

"The government is gradually reforming itself and society under the ‘One Malaysia’ concept," he told IPS, referring to Najib’s idea of uniting the different races in Malaysia and distributing national resources in a just, fair and egalitarian manner.

Although this goal pertains to the future, ordinary people are already warming up to the ideal, as shown by numerous opinion polls.

But Anwar has promised dramatic reforms in his political agenda for change. His coalition party released a Common Policy Platform document in December 2009 outlining the major reform measures they would take if they were voted to power in the next general election, which many expect to happen next year although the government’s term ends in 2013. Read more..

Infernal Rambling Over Projects

Hantu Laut

Cronyism,nepotism and corruptions are not exclusive to UMNO.The pot that called the kettle black is getting darker each passing day.

Pakatan as clean as a whistle image are slowly being stripped by the internal squabbles about who should get what contract.Would they be any better when they sit in Putrajaya?

All the sloganeering about wanting to replace the corrupt regime to clean up corruptions are just mere histrionics to hoodwink the people.A doom-laden unholy alliance destined for the history book.

The story here.