The family of missing Pastor Raymond Koh has urged the government to protect Special Branch member Shamzaini Daud, whose revelations helped expose alleged police involvement in the enforced disappearances of Koh and activist Amri Che Mat.
They said Shamzaini’s decision to “come clean and tell the truth” enabled them to gather crucial evidence on the role of certain police officers in the alleged abductions.
“We hope individuals of integrity like Sergeant Shamzaini will be protected, as they are a bastion of truth in today’s fast, morally decrepit world,” the family said in a statement after the High Court ordered the government and police to pay over RM37 million in damages for Koh’s 2017 abduction.
During the trial for Amri’s case, the court heard that Shamzaini had told Amri’s wife, Norhayati Ariffin, that police officers were allegedly involved in her husband’s disappearance in 2016, and that the same group was also behind Koh’s abduction the following year.
The High Court also ordered the government to pay more than RM3 million to Amri’s family for failure to conduct proper investigations into his disappearance.
The Koh family welcomed Wednesday’s judgment, describing it as “honest and fair”, and said it validated not only their suffering but that of all victims of enforced disappearance.
They reiterated their call on the government to act on findings by Suhakam, the special task force, and now the High Court by establishing a royal commission of inquiry to investigate all individuals named in the reports, and to form a new task force within the police, separate from the Special Branch, to locate Saiful Bahari Abdul Aziz, identified by the task force as the main suspect.
The family also expressed shock that the attorney-general had announced plans to appeal even before the full written judgment was released.
“It is baffling that neither the Cabinet nor the attorney-general took any action despite their own commissioned report clearly stating that police officers were involved,” they said.
They noted that both the Suhakam inquiry, chaired by former Court of Appeal judge Mah Weng Kwai, and the special task force formed under Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s administration had already identified specific police officers linked to the abductions.
The family said the High Court’s verdict had now reaffirmed these findings, and urged authorities to ensure accountability.
“When injustice is done to an individual and covered up, it is actually an injustice done to everybody,” they said.
