Malaysia's volunteer corps not to be held responsible for actions when
Updated
Malaysia is set to use its controversial people's volunteer corp to help enforce a crackdown on crime.
But human rights groups warn the volunteers known as RELA have no police training and are a law unto themselves as they have legal immunity.
RELA has been accused of serious rights abuses when the government in the past used them to track down illegal immigrants.
Presenter: Claudette Werden
speakers Temme Lee, SUARAM Program Coordinator
LEE: RELA has not had proper training in law enforcement and even the law to begin with.
WERDEN: And is it true that these volunteers have legal immunity and are allowed to arrest individuals as well as enter and search premises without a warrant
LEE: They have a right to carry arms and according to the law they are not accountable for their conduct during duty they cannot be held accountable for their conduct during duty. So this gives them a lot of power with no accountability system no checks and balances and this is even more power than the police force.
WERDEN: And when will the government introduce this?
LEE: Firsty it was reported that they started training a group of RELA volunteers to be used in combatting crime and according to the news report, the training is only for two weeks. I don't see how 2 weeks will be sufficient to train a person to be skilled in law enforcement and as such they don't have the proper knowledge and skills that a policeforce would have when it comes to enforcement.
WERDEN: What's prompted the government to take some of these volunteers
LEE: The government claims that they don't have enough police personnel, we believe that there are a lot of people in the police force, it's just that not all of them are assigned to do policing work, a lot of it is administrative and intelligence, so instead of using RELA, the government should look into hiring more police personnel instead.
WERDEN: I think there've been comments made in the media saying the decision by the Prime Minister to introduce these volunteers as a way of cutting crime by 20% is part of a raft of measures aimed at appeasing public dissatisfaction but do you think the public will be pleased with this initiative or do you think it will backfire on the government?
LEE: It could actually, I suppose the public doesn't really care how the government handles crime as long as they reduce the crime rate but a lot of abuses that goes on, goes on unseen by the public eye for instance even with our police force even though they are properly trained, they have committed a lot of human rights abuses, there are a lot of cases of deaths in custody. a lot of corruption goes on in our police force, and these are trained police force if you rope in volunteers, people who are untrained, people who are not given the proper skills, given adequate time to be trained, obviously the amount of human rights abuses will increase in comparison and this will eventually become a problem for the government when normal citizens find they are subject to abuse by RELA.
