When The Victim is An ADUN....

Bentayan

Our housing estate, Taman Sri Maharani(TSM) is situated within the Bentayan electorate.

If you are aware, Bentayan is now more popular than Muar town itself because for its infamous ADUN, newly elected YB Gwee Tong Hiang.

YB Gwee had stole the limelight by refusing to wear the ceremonial attire during the first seating of Johor state assembly recently.
While I am guessing here that he had not meet the Sultan in person before, but the fact remains that the Sultan already knew him well!

When ADUN falls Victim
Last Tuesday, on 8 July 2008, YB Gwee was made a victim of a house break-in. His residence in Sungai Abong was ransacked by burlgers on broad daylight. The unfortunate incident happened between 10am to 12pm.

YB Gwee suffered financial losses. His front door was forced opened and the whole house turned into a mess. And of course, YB Gwee acted fast to inform the printed press about his story.

According to YB Gwee's blog, the taman he stays has a Residents Committee. Residents had contributed into a fund to hire security guards to man the area from 7 a.m-7 p.m daily. (What about from 7.01a.m to 6.59 p.m?)

Lessons learnt
Thieves do not consider your social status especially when they are desperate for money and valuables. In other word, you do not enjoy immunity even if you are a MP, Adun or a Who's who in the society.

Everybody is equal in the eye of the criminals and everybody has equal chance of becoming the next victim if he or she is not careful.

If I were YB Gwee, I would :

1) Start Community Policing(CP) in Sungai Abong area a.s.a.p
2) Work smart with the Police and request for police personnel to be allocated here
3) Invite the residents especially those remain at home(children, housewives, elderly etc) during daytime to be the eyes & ears to the police
4) Seek assitance from pejabat Perpaduan or the nearest KRT centre
5) Seek advice from the OCPD of ways to improve the security measures
6) Read TSM's blog in CP to find out more about the CP strategies

Security Guards
Hiring security guards is not always a clever idea because it involves money. When money matters, your neighbours and residents have two common answers for you, a "yes o.k lorrr... " or a "no, sorry horrr...." that always complicate things further.

In big cities, there were cases that your trusted neighbourhood security guards during the day turned into evil thieves during the night. You paid for them to break into your own house!

It is common to see security guards who look more like drug addicts with long hair and a messy apperarance. With a very basic salary package and a poor vetted system and insufficient training provided by the security companies, may God bless you on your safety!

There is no better option than the residents themselves playing a pro-active role in manning their own local security. Here is the math: if you pay RM 50 per month for security guards, it comes to RM 600.00 a year. If you have 200 houses in your housing estate, you are parking RM 120,00.00 per year into the pocket of the security company.(And they laughed all the way to the bank!)

The same amount of money can be channelled into the funds of a Residents Committee, where a smaller amount of money can be used to organise activities that unite the residents and neighborhood programs that promote racial unity among the local community. Examples are the launching of Rakan Cop, Gotong Royong, Night Patrolling, Raya Open House, and Community Policing.

CCTVs
In Malaysia the lucky country, most CCTVs are very unlucky. We lack the maintainance culture.

After an incident happened, the victim would first thanked God that he had installed CCTVs in his premise. A second look at the CCTVs, he or she would cursed and uttered the four-letter words because the CCTVs are not working during "that moment!"

Some CCTVs are positioned at the wrong locations and therefore, you failed to track down the culprits. When installing CCTVs: 1) Go for a reputable company 2) Don't go for cheap and low quality products 3) Make sure you are prepared to pay for its maintanance fee for a tip-top condition! (Maintanance,maintanance & maintanance..)

The Best CCTV are Free
Yes, the best CCTVs are free of charge. They can also talk!

They work anywhere, anytime and the images are super clear! I am talking about your eyes, your ears and your mouth! Nothing can beat human eyes.

Be alert and once you discover something fishy, use your ears to listen carefully and use your
mouth to report to the nearest police station.


The TSM Way
Instead of pouring cold water and add salt into injury, we believe in smart partnership with the local police force to formulate strategies to prevent crime. We always tell the people:"Let's help the police to help us!"






Moving Police Vechicle (MPV)

Nobody was told that in a polite way, you can stop the MPV when you see one patrolling your taman!

Wave your hand and I assure you that the driver will wave his hand to you as well. In practice, TSM advised the residents to greet the MPV when they see them.

A casual greeting and a 30 seconds stop to chit-chat will foster friendship and trust among each other and of course, good for the long run.

Meet your friendly CP Cops
Never heard it before right? Because TSM is moving very fast in its effort in crime prevention. We are not saying we are prefect but we stand united as a taman. Our residents are trying to improve themselves from time to time.

TSM is taking part in the CP pilot project in Johor, we have three CP Cops allocated for TSM. They have started their duties by going house-to house to introduce themselves to residents and to explain the importance of keeping in touch. Best of all,their handphone numbers are given away for emergency usage.

Corporal Zul led the two constables, En.Zahrudin and En.Badrul to say hello to TSM residents. They got to know new friends and to better understand the common challanges faced by the locals.

All ended well on a Thursday, and three of them returned home with great satisfaction!(Because for a single evening with the help of TSM resident committee, they met up with at least 20 houses! It was a record!)