Suhakam must lodge police report on prison officers' false testimonies now!

Suara Rakyat Malaysia (Suaram) is gravely concerned by the Malaysian human rights commission Suhakam’s hesitation to lodge police reports against prison officers who have lied under oath during Suhakam’s ongoing public inquiry into the 17 January assault at Taiping Prison.

Suaram has observed that several staff members from Taiping Prison who have testified thus far began by denying under oath any involvement in hitting or kicking detainees. These denials were flatly contradicted by CCTV recordings shown during the inquiry.

When shown the recordings, only some officers admitted to their actions – after repeated warnings from the inquiry panel that they were under oath. Others continued to downplay their conduct using euphemistic terms such as “sentuh”, or by citing intent such as “menakut-nakutkan”.

For some, this is not the first instance of false testimony: their sworn statements to Suhakam in March 2025 similarly omitted or denied any involvement, despite evidence to the contrary.

In Wednesday’s proceedings, family counsel Shashi Devan made an urgent and justified call for Suhakam to act. He emphasised that delaying action until the inquiry concludes will send the wrong message to witnesses who are yet to testify.

Suaram agrees. Repeated breaches of the oath should not be allowed to accumulate unchecked.

Each dishonest testimony risks obscuring case details that are not visible in the CCTV recordings, which lack audio. Such details are essential for Suhakam to establish a complete picture of the events, institutional dynamics and underlying causes necessary for credible findings and effective reform recommendations.

The argument that lodging a police report would create an “investigation within an investigation” is also misplaced. A police report does not interfere with Suhakam’s inquiry – since the inquiry focuses on uncovering systemic failures through the assault in Taiping Prison and recommending critical prison reforms, while a police investigation of a report focuses on specific violations of the law.

We maintain that by acting against false testimony, Suhakam will be safeguarding the integrity of the inquiry.

To illustrate the extent and seriousness of this issue, we provide two examples.

First, on day 11 of the inquiry, prison officer Raja Masuri Mansor repeatedly denied using his phone to record the assault, despite CCTV footage clearly showing he did. No further evidence is required to prove he was lying, since no one has questioned the veracity of the CCTV recording. We note that although four weeks have passed since Masuri testified, Suhakam has not recovered the phone he used.

Second, there was a striking similarity in the testimonies of all five officers in week four of the inquiry. All the officers cited utterances of profanities, and death or rape threats by detainees as the reason why they “lost it” and thrashed the detainees. These near-verbatim patterns raise serious concerns of coaching or collusion. We note that there is sworn evidence they had met together in a room to watch the recordings before they came to testify.

The inquiry panel, conducting officers and observers have had to spend much time and effort establishing truths that should have been voluntarily disclosed. On 7 August, testimony by Khairol Azmeer Ibrahim underscores this. He was later recalled for further questioning on key inconsistencies, including his purported knowledge of deceased detainee Gan Chin Eng’s history of heart problems and whether he had met other Taiping Prison officers while lodging the police report on Gan’s death.

In the face of such protracted attempts to untangle misleading accounts, Suhakam’s continued inaction is untenable.

If Suhakam fails to act now despite what appears to us glaring evidence of false testimony, it risks setting a damaging precedent for its future inquiries it holds -and by extension, dents the independence, effectiveness and integrity of its human rights protection mandate as an A-status national human rights institution.

Suaram therefore calls on Suhakam to immediately lodge a police report to commence an independent investigation into the pattern of false and misleading testimony observed during the inquiry.

If Suhakam is to play a serious role in holding enforcement authorities accountable, it must demonstrate that its processes cannot be manipulated.

Delaying action only sends the wrong signal about institutional tolerance for false testimony under oath and weakens public confidence in the inquiry’s outcome. – Suaram

 Azura Nasron is the executive director of Suaram.