MGG105

Bila Hakim Menghadiri Majlis Harijadi

(MGG: A Judge Attends A Birthday Party)

Mr Paari Vellu anak kepada presiden MIC telah menaja satu majlis harijadi untuk anak perempuannya di Kshipra's sebuah restoren yang dimilikki oleh ibunya di Brickfields. Jalan raya penuh sesak kerana banyaknya kereta Mercedez yang datang melanda dengan kumpulan ningrat yang mahu bersuka-suka. Majlis ini juga telah menjemput seorang hakim mahkamah tinggi yang turut serta untuk meraikannya. Hakim R.K. Nathan telah muncul walaupun dia merupakan salah seorang hakim yang sedang mengadili satu kes yang dikemukakan oeh MIC terhadap sebuah akhbar tempatan. Dia fikir tidak ada masalah menghadiri jamuan itu kerana dia terus keluar selepas berada tidak berapa lama di situ. Dia fikir majlis harijadi itu merupakan satu majlis kecil sahaja tanpa menyangkakan begitu ramai orang yang berkerumun di situ. Tentu sekali dia terkejut mengetahui bahawa bapa Mr. Paari Vellu adalah presiden MIC dan oleh kerana itu dia bergegas meninggalkan majlis itu. Dia masih merasa jengkel kalau-kalau ada orang akhbar yang akan melaporkan kehadirannya itu.

Apakah kemungkinannya hakim itu menarik diri daripada mendengar kes di mahakamah kalau pihak yang didakwa membuat permohonan tanpa menunjukkan gambar sebagai bukti? Mampukah dia melakukannya tanpa sebarang permohonan? Satu ketika dulu, Tun Suffian, yang menjadi Ketua Hakim Negara telah menarik dirinya setelah mendengar desas-desus yang tersibar di sebuah jamuan koktail. Dia terdengar rungutan betapa kehadirannya dalam satu kes itu akan mencemar keputusan mahkamah yang akan dibuatnya. Bagimana pula cara Hakim Nathan mahu menarik dirinya sedangkan ada satu kes yang terdahulu di mana dia enggan berbuat demikian disebabkan tanda hormatnya kepada Ketua Hakim Negara yang telah melantiknya untuk tugas mendengar kes itu. Mungkinkah peraturan yang sama dikenakan dalam hal ini? Secara amalannya, beliau merupakan penasihat undang-unang kepada presiden MIC itu. Memang tidak ramai yang percaya pihak yang didakwa dapat menikmati keadilan dalam kes mereka. Tidak kiralah kalau hakim yang mengadili itu merupakan Nabi Sulaiman, sendiri. Hakim Nathan tidak boleh menghakimi kes yeng membabitkan MIC itu; apatah lagi dengan tindakannya menghadiri satu majlis harijadi untuk cucu presiden tersebut.

Satu hari nanti, sikap kejujuran dan ketelusan akan menjadi satu kayu-pengukur yang menentukan keadilan kepada sistem perundangan di negara ini. Selagi perkara ini menjadi satu tandatanya yang besar, masakini, keadilan akan hanya merupakan satu alat untuk menekan pihak yang memerlukan keadilan itu. Pengadilan tidak boleh dinilai secara tersendiri. Ia mempunyai hubungkait dengan persekitarannya. Seorang bekas Ketua hakim Negara, Tun Azmi, pernah berkata betapa dia tidak memerlukan kepujian apabila ada sesiapa yang keluar daripada satu kes mahkamah merasakan dia telah menerima pengadilan yang saksama. Perkara seperti ini tidak mudah dijumpai lagi. Tidak ada sesiapa di kalangan hakim yang ada yang mahu mendera seseorang peniaga yang berkroni dengannya. Terutama sekali apabila si peniaga itu ditemani oleh seorang peguam kroni. Tidak kiralah kalau kesnya itu amat lemah sekali. Hakim itu akan membenarkan peguam kroni tadi menulis keputusan mahkamah mengikut selera si peniaga itu tadi. Sehingga hari ini ketua hakim negara masih lagi belum memberikan jawapan terhadap satu affidavit yang menyangkuti perkara serupa ini. Dia memang tidak berupaya melakukannya kerana dia sendiri telah pergi bersantai ke New Zealand bersama peguam kroni itu dan ahli keluarganya.

Orang yang membuat tuntutan di mahkamah akan menghadapi masalah ongkos yang tinggi dan juga menghadapi penderaan kehakiman seandainya peraturan sengaja diperlekehkan oleh ketua hakim negara itu. Persaraan ketua hakim negara yang dijaduallkan pada bulan Disember itu memang dinantikan oleh majlis peguam, kebanyakan hakim dan juga oleh kerajaan. Kereputan sistem kehakiman netgara itu sungguh menjijikkan sehinggakan ia memerlukan satu pembedahan yang besar untuk memperbetulkan keadaan. Selagi itu tidak berlaku terpaksalah kita bersabar menyaksikan gelagat yang Arif itu.

Rencana Asal:

A Judge Attends A Birthday Party

The MIC president, Dato' Seri S. Samy Vellu's son, Mr Paari Vellu, throws a birthday bash for his daughter at Kshipra's, his mother's restaurant in Brickfields. The road was chocker-block with high-end Mercedes Benzes and other baubles of the self-important and rentier-seekers. To this august gathering is invited one High Court judge, the only one, so he told the court, not from the MIC. Judge R.K. Nathan turns up though he sits in judgement in a defamation action the MIC brought against a newspaper. He reasons nothing untoward had happened, since he left almost immediately on seeing the crowd. He had thought it a small function that loving parents hold for their first born. No doubt he was more than surprised to learn that Mr Paari Vellu's father is the president of the MIC! And it dawned on him only when he arrived. Since he left immediately, judicial decorum is preserved, his ire directed at the newspapers for reporting the event and his presence.

Would he have recused if the litigants had requested for it without photographic evidence? Would he have without a request? The much lamented Tun Suffian, when Lord President, recused himself because the gossip he heard at a c##ktail party about an appellant before him could cloud his judgement. How does Judge Nathan square his recusal with his refusal, in another case, to recuse because to do so would put him on collision course with the chief justice who assigned him the case? Should not that rule apply here too? He was, in practice, briefly legal adviser to the MIC president. Few believe the defendants could expect justice in this case. It does not matter if the judge is Solomon himself if public perception decides he cannot be. He should not have been judge in this case; nor agreed to present himself at the MIC president's grandaughter's birthday party.

Ultimately judicial probity and fairplay would set the standards of justice. So long as that is questioned -- and it is, now -- justice will, for some, be an agency to oppress litigants. Justice cannot be viewed in isolation. It must relate to the world around him. And this world puts it on notice. A former Lord president, Tun Azmi, once said he would want no more accolade than for a litigant who lost his court leaving it convinced he had had a fair hearing. That is not so now. No judge would decide against a crony business man, especially when accompanied by crony lawyers, however weak his case. He would even allow the business man's lawyer to write the judgement the business man wants. Indeed, the chief justice does not respond to an affidavit about this filed in the courts. But then could he when he goes on holiday to New Zealand with the crony lawyer and their families? Litigants are put to unnecessary expense and judicial harassement when routine orders are denied so that a higher court could decide on its merits. And lawyers cited for contempt when they pursue their clients' cases vigorously.

But all is not lost. Several judges, sidelined for not lending their names for this judicial abberation, maintain their respect and behave with utmost probity and judicial discretion. Much dwells upon them to guide the judiciary back to the justifiable reputation in had less than two decades ago. So long as judges believe that they could do what they like, so long as they do not get caught, they cannot be relied upon to adjudicate fairly in their courts. A bent judge, however brilliant and judicially esteemed and thought of, remains a bent judge. This throws into question even the most noteworth of his judgements. Tun Hamid Omar was, by any standard, a competent judge, who removed the cobwebs of the past from the administration, but his friendship with a business man whose empire did not survie his death destroyed his reputation as a judge. His unjudicial alacrity in presiding over the tribunal to dismiss a man whose successor he was, destroyed his reputation for ever. The judicial malaise now results from that misjudgement. Judges could do what they like so long as they are not caught. And woe betide a litigant who, because of these failings want the judge recused.

M.G.G. Pillai
pillai@mgg.pc.my