Last Monday in Parliament, I received an answer from the Prime Minister and Internal Security Minister, Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi that the crime index had registered a 8.7 per cent increase in the first five months of this year as compared to the corresponding period last year, i.e 87,582 cases from Jan. to May 2007 as compared to 80,756 cases for the period last year.

Five days later, the Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Musa Hassan updated the crime statistics showing that for the first six months of the year, there had been a 5.11 per cent increase in the crime index as compared to the corresponding period last year. i.e. 106,236 cases from Jan. to June 2007 as compared to 101,073 cases for the period last year.

From Abdullah and Musa’s statements, we can deduce that the average monthly crime incidence for the first five months of this year was 17,516 cases (87,582/5), while the crime incidence for June was 18,654, i.e. the crime incidence in June was 6.5% higher than the monthly average crime index recorded in the first five months of the year.

Malaysians must speak up and make clear that they find it completely unacceptable that the crime index keeps climbing up, reflecting an ever-worsening situation with regard to crime and the fear of crime in the country defeating the very purpose of the establishment of the Royal Police Commission in 2004 to have a world-class police service and reduce crime in the country.

In the first six months of this year, there were 1,507 cases of rape as compared to 1,186 for the corresponding period last year — an increase of 27.1%. This works out to 8.2 cases of rape per day in the first six months of this year as compared to four cases a day in 2003 and 6.7 cases a day in 2006 — another shocking index of the worsening crime and fear-of-crime situation in the country, bearing in mind the high percentage of unreported cases of crime.

The Royal Police Commission had recommended a sustained nation-wide drive against crime, backed up by an annual and monthly crime reduction plans by the police. Musa should make public the national and local, annual and monthly, crime reduction plans to allow the closest public scrutiny and involvement of all Malaysian stakeholders in a nation-wide drive against crime so as to restore to Malaysians, tourists and investors a safe and secure environment where crime is low and where the fear-of-crime is eradicated and non-existent just like two decades ago.

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