Bar Council chairperson Ragunath Kesavan told a Human Rights Commission of Malaysia Suhakam) public inquiry today that lawyers were not above the law as there had been cases of lawyers being arrested by the police.
He said as such, the arrest of five lawyers from the Kuala Lumpur Legal Aid Centre by police on May 7, 2009, was not the first case as prior to that veteran lawyer Karpal Singh had been arrested and charged for allegedly uttering seditious words, and several other lawyers had also been charged in court.
However, Ragunath said what the Bar was concerned was how and why they (the KL Legal Aid Centre lawyers) were arrested by the police as they had gone to the police station to meet their clients who had called to say they were in police custody.
"The police arrested them when they were on duty. They were not taking part in the assembly in front of the Brickfields police station. They were there to see their clients," he said.
Ragunath said if the five lawyers who were arrested were part of the assembly, the Bar would not have called for an Extraordinary General Meeting (EGM) after their arrest.
He was speaking at the inquiry which started on Friday and is chaired by Suhakam commissioner Muhammad Shafee Abdullah and assisted by commissioners Micheal Yeoh Onn Kheng and Denison Jayasooria.
Among those arrested were Fadiah Nadwa Fikri, Murnie Hidayah Anuar, RavinderSingh Dhalliwal and Syuhaini Safwan. They were arrested at 9.30pm on May 7, and were released the next day.
Ordered to leave balai
Ragunath, who is former Legal Aid chairperson, also told the inquiry that the five lawyers were senior members of the Legal Aid Centre and they knew what an illegal assembly was as every member of the Legal Aid team were taught protocol on how to act and behave in incidents such as an illegal assembly.
He also said after he knew about the five lawyers (left) being arrested, he went to the Jalan Travers police station where they were detained on May 8, but was not allowed to see them.
"I insisted that I be allowed to see them but the police without any reasons denied permission. A police officer also said to me "Get out from my balai or I will arrest you," he claimed.
Ragunath said he informed the officer in charge that he was the Bar Council chairperson, but they still refused to give him access to the lawyers.
"I followed the police order and left the police station," he said, adding that the Bar planned to engage counsel for them if they were charged in court.
Earlier, Fadiah Nadwa, 26, had told the inquiry that she and her colleagues had repeatedly asked the police for proof that their clients (detained participants of the illegal assembly) had waived their right to a lawyer but DSP Jude Pereira just ignored them.
The inquiry, which is being held at Suhakam's inquiry room on the 29th floor of Menara Tun Razak in KL, will resume on Aug 29.
(Bernama cited as source but taken from malaysiakini, Aug 16, 09 6:19pm)
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