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News Focus: Parliament unveils Special Complaints Commission (The former IPCMC)By : V. Vasudevan
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Datuk Seri Mohd Nazri Abdul Aziz says the commission will hear complaints against other agencies too
KUALA LUMPUR: The much awaited Independent Police Complaints and Misconduct Commission (IPCMC) was unveiled yesterday in parliament as the Special Complaints Commission (SCC).
It will address complaints of misconduct not just against the police but all enforcement agencies.Minister in the Prime Minister's Department Datuk Seri Mohd Nazri Abdul Aziz tabled the first reading of the bill in the Dewan Rakyat yesterday."Let us not forget there are other agencies in the country which the public has complaints about. It would be silly to focus on one agency only. The commission will provide an avenue for complaints against these agencies, too."That was the concept from the very beginning when it was still a draft bill. The concept has always been to cover the entire enforcement apparatus," he said in the parliament lobby.
Apart from the police, Nazri said the other agencies included the enforcement units of the Customs and Excise Department, the Road Transport Department and the Immigration Department."The public can lodge a complaint against any government agency with an enforcement unit whose members had mistreated them." Under the bill, the SCC will give the police and connected agencies first choice to discipline errant personnel. Failing this, the SCC will take over through a task force.The SCC can also decide from the outset not to refer any complaint on an enforcement agency to its disciplinary authority if it feels that the agency does not have the capacity to act impartially."The members of the task force can be drawn from the ACA, Bank Negara, Securities Commission, National Audit Department, police and other members of the civil service, including officers from the Judicial and Legal Services Department," Nazri said.Under the bill, whistleblowers or informers will be protected and their identities kept secret.The commission is empowered to reject any complaint which it thinks has no merit.The commission will consist of seven members comprising a chairman appointed by the prime minister, the inspector-general of police, the director-general of the Public Complaints Bureau, the director-general of the Anti-Corruption Agency and three others.Each commission member will have a two-year term of office and be eligible to hold office for a maximum of two terms.The bill states that every enforcement agency will have to co-operate with and assist the commission in exercising its functions and powers under the act.Members of the commission, its chief executive officer and members of the task force will all have the powers of a police officer of rank as provided for under the Criminal Procedure Code, and such powers will be in addition to that provided by the act.This includes powers of search and seizure with warrant and without warrant of premises and the power to stop, search and seize conveyances.An enforcement agency facing a complaint before the commission will have to submit monthly reports until the conclusion of the investigation, upon which the public prosecutor will have to decide in 30 days whether to charge the enforcement officer.
