Hope and hopelessness awaiting new IGP

Harakahdaily

KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 3:  Since the news of the retirement of Inspector General of Police Musa Hassan was announced earlier this week, the IGP-in-waiting Ismail Omar (pic) is being closely watched by politicians and observers. Home minister Hishamuddin Hussein had said Musa's contract which expires on Sept 12 would not be renewed, and announced his deputy Ismail as replacement. PAS leaders have raised the usual concern on the IGP's independence and whether he could discharge his duties freely without having to toe UMNO's political agenda. “My worry is that the UMNO-BN government will also turn him into a tool, although I believe he is someone who has strong principles and possesses high integrity,” said PAS vice president Mahfuz Omar in remarks to Harakahdaily today. Mahfuz added that the UMNO-led government still wielded power over the police force through the Home ministry. Ismail, a law graduate from International Islamic University, began his career as an inspector in 1971, and held various posts in the force in Seremban, Ipoh and Bukit Aman. Before his promotion as Deputy IGP, he served as the Deputy Director of the Anti-Narcotics Department, Selangor police chief and Bukit Aman Director of Management. Bukit Gantang member of parliament Nizar Jamaluddin expressed hope that Ismail would be able to restore public confidence in the police force which he said had been severely tarnished. “I also hope that the new IGP will investigate and reveal the suicide and murder case of Allahyarham Aziz and Rohana," he said, referring to the death of former Permatang state assemblyman Abdul Aziz Mohd Noh and his aide Siti Rohana Ismat in early August, classified as "murder-suicide" by the police. Aziz, 64, was found dead by a single gunshot together with Rohana, 43, who was shot twice in the head in a car along the North-South Expressway near Sungai Buloh. The Selangor police however closed the file on case, saying the details were now merely “academic”. PKR supreme council member Zaid Ibrahim was less optimistic, saying that the 57-year old Ismail's appointment was a "goodbye gift" in view of his impending retirement. “What is the point of appointing someone who himself will probably have to retire in what, a year? How long can this Tan Sri [Ismail] go on?” Zaid was quoted by online news portal The Malaysian Insider as saying. But the strongest comments came from none other than self-exiled blogger Raja Petra Kamaruddin, who expressed joy over Musa's departure. Writing in his blog Malaysia Today, Petra claimed that prime minister Najib Razak had lost patience on Musa's many failures, including the police's failure to extradite Petra, the blunders in Anwar Ibrahim’s sodomy trial and the inquest into the mysterious death of Teoh Beng Hock. Saying Ismail will be watched closely so that he would not follow Musa’s footsteps, Petra had this to say about the outgoing IGP: “But then, no one can ever screw up the way Musa did, not in a thousand years. Musa is one-in-a-million."