by Ketua Pembangkang and DAP Secretary-General, Lim Kit Siang:
Call to Inspector-General of Police, Tan Sri Haniff Omar, to review the case of FONG SENG MENG, Malacca State Football Captain, who is under detention in Pulau Jerejak
I have received representations from the family and friends of Malacca State Football Captain, FONG SENG MENG, who had been detained under the Ordinance Darurat (Ketenteraman Awam dan Pencegah Jenayah 1969) and is detained in Pulau Jerejak.
FONG SENG MENG, 32, was accused of being a secret society gang leader.
I have made separate investigations, and I am satisfied that FONG SENG MENG was not a secret society gang leader.
I call on the Inspector-General of Police, Tan Sri Haniff Omar, to review this case, and to terminate the order detaining FONG SENG MENG at Pulau Jerejak, which should be a place for persons who have a bad criminal record, which is not the case with FONG.
It is talk of Malacca town that FONG SENG MENG had been sent to Pulau Jerejak because he had antagonized some influential person in town, who had used his influence to get FONG sent to Pulau Jerejak.
In view of the fact that the 1969 Emergency Ordinance empowers the detention of a person in Pulau Jerejak without having to produce him in court or to substantiate the police charges against him, it is all the more important, if public confidence in police integrity and impartiality is to be maintained, that justice should not only be done, but be seen to be done.
In the absence of a strong and irrefutable case for the detention of FONG SENG MENG in Pulau Jerejak, the public are likely to believe and accept the version that FONG had in fact been victimised.
I am writing to the IGP giving him my view as stated above and asking him review this case. FONG has aged parents, 74-year old father, FONG KOK, 62-year-old mother KHOO AH YONG, a wife, ONG HAN KWEE, 29 an a 8-month-old boy FONG CHOON WAH.
FONG, who had captained Malacca State in football, had been representing the State since 1965 until 1972, when he went to Hong Kong as a professional footballer for two years. On his return in 1974, until his arrest, he had again represented the State in State football competitions.