Abdul Aziz Bari - Judicial independence is a matter of perception...

Anwar has been saying that Pakatan will surely win Putrajaya in the coming general election if he gets jailed. But otherwise, it has a good chance of winning.

It is difficult to convince the people - who feel they have been fooled by the BN and that their intelligence has been humiliated - that yesterday's ‘not guilty' verdict is nothing but to save the BN from slipping down further.

And what about all those taunts put up by Umno leaders about Anwar's character all these while?

That is why I say that yesterday's verdict in the Sodomy II trial does not help BN's fortune much.

The court still has to answer why it waited until now, after so much time and money have been spent on the trial. The taxpayers still have grounds to be unhappy with the way BN and the courts have been conducting themselves.

It does not necessarily follow that the verdict means the Judiciary is truly independent. Of course, that is what BN and the judges would say.

But as judicial independence is a matter of perception and this hinges on certain facts, they have to accept what the people out there think about it.

The fact remains that the next general election must be held in about a year from now and BN has slipped further down as a result of various scandals, etc.

Judiciary only has itself to blame

The Anwar case, obviously, will have a lot of impact on the election, simply because he is the leader of the opposition.

In a way, the verdict may be seen to indicate that the judicial process might be influenced by events, for this case has attracted public outcry and the huge crowds Anwar has been attracting, as well as the huge assembly outside the court complex yesterday, might be seen as having some bearings on the outcome of the case.

That is surely bad for the notion of judicial independence, for now people would think that the outcome might have been dictated by events outside the court.

But the Judiciary only has itself to blame. Apart from yesterday's verdict, people have been unhappy over the way the judges handled the cases involving the Perak crisis, PKR's Batu MP Tian Chua and the DAP's Seputeh MP Teresa Kok, all of which underline the presence of the BN tentacles in the system.

It does not necessarily follow that court verdicts mean the Judiciary is truly independent. Of course, that is what BN and the judges would say.

But as judicial independence is a matter of perception and this hinges on certain facts, they have to accept what the people out there think about it. - ABDUL AZIZ BARI

source:malaysiakini

cheers.