Compassionate Police Force

Malaysia is actually blessed with one of the most compassionate police forces in the world. While some may deride them as polis raja di Malaysia, they are actually quite fun to deal with in certain situations. Unfortunately, I did not read this article in TheStar until much later but it still does not change some of the examples of their compassion that I wish to highlight here.

1. Our police force is extremely efficient at issuing summons. We can witness this in KL all the time, on every major highway. The police will regularly slow traffic to a halt in order to catch those who flaunt traffic regulations and issue on the spot compounds. Sometimes, they will even conceal themselves behind some bushes, trap us with speed cameras and then mail us our summons using our ever efficient postal service.
2. Although extremely efficient at issuing summons, each summon comes with a fairly long grace period. I had only recently received a summons for a speeding offense that I committed in early 2004, before I started my PhD. In the intervening years, no warrant was ever issued for my arrest. However, I did not want to take any chances and decided to settle the summons before the next Ops Warta, which is when they decide to issue arrest warrants.
3. They always give ample warning and advice before acting. In the case of Ops Warta, the police will go through a house-to-house arrest operation for anyone who still had outstanding summons. But before doing that, the police would issue several calls through the newspapers and advise everyone to settle all outstanding summons to avoid arrest. On their part, it would really simplify the paper work if they didn’t need to get that many arrest warrants signed.
4. Instead of settling summons as they arrive, Malaysians can look forward to the annual clearance season where discounts are given on various offenses. This is like one of those clearance sales when we all go out in droves to shop for the latest bargains. A 50% discount is typically given on regular traffic offenses except those that were committed during a special Ops Sikap during festive seasons.
5. The rest of the time, we Malaysians are blessed with a police force that is open to haggling. Just like everything else in Malaysia, police summons are infinitely haggle-able. Depending on the severity of our cases, we can either haggle directly with the officer at the counter or we may need to speak personally to the sergeant in charge for special cases. After a little rayu, we can usually get a discount.
6. In line with the compassionate image of the police force, if we were to show that we are repeat offenders with a tall stack of summons in our pocket, we are very likely to get a bulk discount. It is fairly common for us Malaysians to collect all the summons that we have incurred in a year and then pack it all to the police station to ask for a merciful discount simply because we would not be able to afford paying them all.

Evidently, we are blessed with a truly compassionate and understanding police force. I doubt that we can find such service and understanding from any other police force in the world. The arm of the law is a long but gentle one. I love our Royal Malaysian Police Force!