Article International Journal of Police Science & Management 2015, Vol. 17(1) 9–16 The Royal Malaysia Police has got ª The Author(s) 2015 Reprints and permission: its strategy wrong: Laws alone sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav DOI: 10.1177/1461355714566777 do not bring down crime rates psm.sagepub.com Yik Koon Teh Department of Strategic Studies, National Defence University of Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia Abstract The Malaysian police appealed to parliament to reinstate preventive detention without trial laws, such as the Emergency Ordinance and the Prevention of Crime Act 1959, to reduce crimes. These laws were abolished in 2012 because they violate the rights of ‘innocent until proven guilty’ and have been abused. Although the legal profession and civil society disagreed with their reinstatement, parliament amended the Prevention of Crime Act in 2013. This article shows that such laws alone have not been effective in crime prevention and that the crime rate declined between 2009 and 2012 because of the implementation of scientifically tested methods such as installing closed-circuit televisions, and the government’s mobilisation of the police to hot spots in order to meet the National Key Results Areas target of reducing crime. Lastly, the article stresses that effective crime prevention involves a judicious combination of both scientific research and strategy. The article believes that the concept of Total Defence mooted in 1986 by the Ministry of Defence should be revisited as a total strategy or comprehensive security strategy for the defence and security of the country. Keywords crime prevention, policing strategy, security strategy, societal security Submitted 06 Jun 2014, accepted 18 Nov 2014 Background crime, fighting corruption, improving student outcomes, raising the living standards of low income households, The 2010 Census reported that Malaysia has a population improving rural development, improving urban public of 28.3 million (Department of Statistics Malaysia, 2010); transport and addressing the cost of living. Each NKRA the number of police personnel is 112,145 (Royal Malaysia is under the purview of a cabinet minister who is accounta- Police, 2013). As such, the ratio of the police to the popula- ble to the prime minister. tion of Malaysia is 1 : 252, which is better than the United The NKRA of reducing crime aims to reverse the rising Nations recommended peacetime police-to-population ratio crime rate and to increase public satisfaction in the services of 222 police per 100,000 of the population or a ratio of provided by the police. This is in view of the 2007 Royal 1:450(Vira,2011). Police Commission Report, which noted that public confi- Since 2009, the Royal Malaysia Police’s strategic plan dence in the police was very low (Teh, 2009). In addition to for reducing the crime rate has been guided by the Govern- being unable to prevent or check crime, the police were ment Transformation Plan (GTP), the brainchild of current viewed as corrupt. This image of the police has not changed Prime Minister, Najib Razak (PEMANDU, 2013). The since 2007, as reflected in the Transparency International GTP, which is implemented under the purview of the Per- formance Management and Delivery Unit or PEMANDU, is a ‘dynamic plan of change’ to ensure that Malaysia will achieve the status of a developed, high-income nation by Corresponding author: Yik Koon Teh, Department of Strategic Studies, National Defence Univer- 2020. In order to achieve the target, seven national key sity of Malaysia, Sungai Besi Camp, 5700 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. results areas (NKRAs) have been identified: reducing Email: [email protected] 10 International Journal of Police Science & Management 17(1) Table 1. Malaysia crime index 2006–2012. 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 Violent offences Murder 604 590 654 601 568 530 602 Rape 2,435 3,176 3,494 3,840 3,693 3,270 2,964 Gang robbery with firearms 68 75 182 815 1,809 318 110 Gang robbery without firearms 2,658 7,093 21,804 23,722 15,809 16,084 16,738 Robbery with firearms 247 197 76 155 309 52 17 Robbery without firearms 18,446 17,235 4,959 4,862 3,834 3,871 3,275 Voluntarily causing hurt 5,716 6,793 6,648 8,370 8,111 6,537 6,244 Total 30,174 35,159 37,817 42,365 34,133 30,662 29,950 Property offences Thefts 37,128 44,646 41,215 40,864 36,406 30,502 24,299 Van/lorry/heavy machinery thefts 6,328 5,047 6,263 5,524 4,774 4,472 4,526 Car thefts 11,101 12,428 15,198 14,222 15,290 16,110 16,196 Motorcycle thefts 64,858 67,606 67,359 61,394 54,557 50,896 51,259 Snatch thefts 9,551 11,106 8,205 9,739 5,950 3,453 2,500 Housebreaking and thefts during the day 8,253 9,160 9,118 38,570 35,052 30,200 24,939 Housebreaking and thefts during the night 19,060 24,430 26,470 Total 156,279 174,423 173,828 170,313 152,029 135,633 123,719 Total of crime index 186,453 209,582 211,645 212,678 186,162 166,295 153,669 (Violent crimes þ property crimes) Source: Royal Malaysia Police (2014). Survey reported in Bloomberg BusinessWeek on 9 July Ibrahim, who was shot three times when the car he was 2013. In the report, the police and political parties are per- travelling in stopped at traffic lights (The New Straits ceived by Malaysians to be the country’s most corrupt insti- Times, 27 April 2013). tutions. Although Malaysia has moved up from 60th to 54th The increase in murder and robbery with firearms cases place among 176 countries in Transparency International’s prompted the police, certain anticrime activists and aca- Corruption Perceptions Index, it is ranked worst for bribery demics to call for the abolished Emergency (Public Order among 30 countries surveyed. and Prevention of Crime) Ordinance1 (EO) to be reinstated The steps taken by the government to reduce crime (The Star, 2 August 2013). They argued that the EO provided include installing CCTVs, recruiting more police officers, the tools and means for detaining criminals, and that aboli- mobilising the police Ikatan Relawan Rakyat Malaysia tionoftheEOhadresultedinthereleaseofnearly2000 (RELA, Volunteers of Malaysian People) and Jabatan Per- suspected hardened criminals who contributed to the spike tahanan Awam Malaysia (JPAM, Malaysia Civil Defence in crime, especially serious crime (The Star, 4 July 2013). Department) to crime hot spots and brightening street In a crime prevention forum held on 24 August 2013, the lights. Since these steps were taken, the police have Director of Criminal Investigation, Hadi Ho, revealed that reported a decrease in index crime of 29% between 2009 there were more than 40,000 suspected gang members in and 2012 (Royal Malaysia Police statistics on index crime, the country and that after removal of the preventive deten- see Table 1). tion laws, gang members had become more visible and vio- However, the police also reported that although crime lent (Malaysiakini, 24 August 2013). From the police was down for the period January to June 2013 compared records, 71% of gang members were Indian, 23% were Chi- with the first half of 2012, the numbers of murders and nese and fewer than 5% were Malay. However, in the same robberies with firearms had risen (The Star,2August forum, the Attorney General, Abdul Gani Patail, did not 2013). Overall, violent crime increased from 14,811 to concur with the police. He argued that preventive laws, 15,098 cases. Of this, robbery (including gang robbery) such as the EO, were unnecessary and that existing laws with firearms increased from 69 to 74 cases and murder were sufficient in combating crime. He also pointed out increased from 291 to 322 cases. A few murder cases that only 263 former detainees under the EO have commit- involved high-profile personnel, for example, the founder ted crimes and this included those who were released prior of the Arab–Malaysian Development Bank, Hussain to the repeal of the EO. Moreover, the crime index in Ahmad Najadi, who was shot in a car park and the Cus- Table 1 shows that when the EO was still in place, violence toms Department Deputy Director-General, Shaharuddin crime was increasing in Malaysia, i.e. from 30,174 cases in Teh 11 2006 to 42,365 in 2009. However, between 2009 and 2012, between 2009 and 2012, it was most likely due to the dif- there was a noticeable decrease in violent crime, i.e. from ferent measures taken by the government under the NKRA 42,365 cases in 2009 to 29,950 cases in 2012. The fluctua- for crime prevention. These measures have been proven tion in the crime rate between 2006 and 2012 could not be to reduce the crime rate, particularly if implemented attributed to the EO. A possible reason for the decrease in collectively. Scientific research has been carried out to crime could be the zealousness of the government in meet- evaluate their effectiveness. For example, Welsh and ing the NKRA target for reducing crime. The collective Farrington (2009) carried out a systematic review and effect of the steps taken, for example, installing CCTVs, meta-analysis of 44 evaluations in the UK, USA, Sweden, recruiting more police officers, mobilising the police and Norway and Canada concerning the effects of CCTVs on volunteers to crime hot spots and brightening street lights, crime in public places. Forty-one evaluations were carried might have reduced the crime rate. out in city and town centres, public housing, public trans- In addition to the EO, the police also pushed for amend- port and car parks; two evaluations were carried out in ments to be made to the Prevention of Crime Act 1959 residential areas; and one evaluation was carried out in a (PCA).