What? IPCMC on the top menu?

Prime Minister Abdullah said today that the bill for the setting up of the Independent Police Complaints and Misconduct Commission (IPCMC) will be tabled in the coming parliament session.

The PM said the draft of the bill was ready and was to be tabled in the cabinet before parliament was dissolved for the general election but he held it back because of the GE.

Isn’t that strange?

What about the IPCMC-style Special Complaints Commission Bill 2007 which was tabled for the first reading on Dec 13 in the Dewan Rakyat by Minister in the Prime Minister's Department Mohd Nazri Abdul Aziz?

On Dec 14, the then opposition leader Lim Kit Siang called the SCC bill as a fake IPCMC and pointed to the explanatory statement in the bill which confirmed that the bill was a watered-down version of the much-anticipated IPCMC.

This WAS definitely before the GE, which was held on March 8 this year.

So what is the PM trying to do here with today’s announcement? Has he forgotten about the SCC bill? Or is he trying to regain the people’ trust by putting back the IPCMC back into the frontline as a populist move?

Whatever it may be, he need not be sneaky about doing what is good for the rakyat.