Hafiz's admission: “It is obvious that you have never supported ISIS”. And meeting RRG.
Article #22
Around the period that I met with the lawyers, Eugene and Suang, I began getting printed religious sermons. Being in solitary confinement without communication and connection could create not just emotional and intellectual vacuum but also spiritual emptiness. I felt spiritually alone.
I asked Ong if they could pipe sermons from Friday prayers through the intercom. At least, I could gain some spiritual connection. A few weeks later, while I was running in the yard, two officers, a Chinese lady and Mdm Hamidah came and handed me printed copies (in Malay and English) of MUIS’ Friday sermon. I was allowed to have the printed sermon for 2 days before returning it to the ISD.
MUIS sermons were as expected, focused on personal character building. I would read the sermons to get English translations of Quran texts and for recommendation on prayers to recite. I looked forward to them.
I was also introduced to another ISD officer. Assistant Superintendent (ASP) Amir Asad met with me a few days after my birthday. On my birthday, I was brought to the interrogation room to enjoy a feast. There was cake and chocolate and various food. I appreciated the gesture.
I met Amir in one of my last meetings with Chang. Chang stopped meeting me around October when I insisted to meet with a lawyer. It seems that Chang’s main purpose after my Detention Order was given, was to dissuade me from getting legal representation.
According to Amir, he was part of Tim’s team and oversaw my rehabilitation. At first, he told me that part of his responsibilities was to arrange for the psychologist and religious counsellor’s visit. Hafiz had told me that he would meet with me once a month. I would ask Amir for the exact date every month. I was later told that Hafiz arranged directly with the ISD detention centre officers .
According to Amir, the psychologists and ISD rehabilitation worked independent of each other. However, there may be areas that overlapped and they would ask Hafiz to probe or “counsel” me in those areas.
Around November, I was told that I would meet with two Ustadz from the Religious Rehabilitation Group (RRG). One was Ustadz Salim Jasman and the other Ustadz Dr Mohamed bin Ali. Ustadz Mohamed was Ustadz Ali’s son, the Chairman of RRG.
We did not discuss much during the first meeting. The session was mainly introductory. I knew the work of the RRG and had always been critical of their close association with the ISD and PAP. I wanted to understand how they viewed their role.
I knew Ustadz Salim from when I was a child. We lived in the same housing estate (Depot Road) and he was friends with my mother. In fact, in that meeting he told me “I don’t know you, but I know your mother.”
Ustadz Mohamed had a PhD in Islamic studies and a Masters in International Studies. I looked forward to the discussion that we would have.
Amir had suggested I tell the two Ustadz that I did not know Islam well and to teach me Islam from the very basic. ISD officers had a habit of denying their suggestions and recommendations. After meeting with the two Ustadz, I met with Amir again. He asked me how the meeting went, and I told him that it went well and I followed his suggestion. He looked angry. “You tell them I tell you? I did not tell you.”
That was not the first time. A lot of times during interrogations, after Tim told me what to say and I repeated them, he would say “You said it, not me.” Amir would pull that act several times over the next few years.
November also marked the first admission that I had nothing to do with ISIS. In my meeting with the psychologist Hafiz, he admitted that “it is obvious that you have never supported ISIS.”
When he made the admission, I was puzzled and relieved at the same time. To acknowledge that he realised I had never supported ISIS implies that he thought I did. If he knew what went on during interrogation, he would know the accusations were false. At the same time, I was relieved because he finally admitted it.
Since Hafiz was primarily responsible for my “rehabilitation”, which was supposedly due to the support for ISIS, acknowledging that I have “never supported ISIS” would naturally mean I did not need to be rehabilitated. If I did not need to be rehabilitated, then I should not be detained.
We had discussed politics, Islam and my meeting with the AB. According to Hafiz, his role was twofold: help me with coping strategies for my detention and to encourage me to stop discussing politics.
Although initially, he did not say that I should not discuss politics.
“I am helping you build other areas. It is like we are building a garden. You don’t just discuss one thing, but a lot of other flowers.” Hafiz had originally assumed that I worked on a binary black/white intellectual approach. In October he told me that not everything was black or white. I agreed. He realised later that I operated a lot in the gray areas. When he found that out, he argued that it was a problem and wanted me to change that too.
I found Hafiz amusing. He demanded I think in very specific ways. Some of his demands did not make sense either due to the ideas themselves or the fact that a demand was made.
For example, he asked me about international relations theories that I worked with. I explained realism, neoliberalism and constructivism. I told him that realists believed in states pursuing self-interest and that conflict is the basis of relationships while constructivist are more ideational, coalitional and accepted that our interpretations and perception were socially constructed.
I was a constructivist.
“I don’t want you to be constructivist. I want you to become a realist” he demanded. He made it sound as though adhering to a theoretical lens was as simple as picking a shirt colour.
But he was adamant. For the rest of my detention, one of his constant demands was for me to abandon constructivism and adopt realism.
By February 2017, 7 months after I was detained and 3 months after conceding that I had never supported ISIS, Hafiz told me that he had nothing to counsel me anymore.
I felt optimistic. If the psychologist admitted that I had never supported ISIS and he did not have anything to counsel me anymore, then I should be released soon.
I had waited to be released from the day after I was arrested. The ISD knew that I did not support ISIS. They had purposefully forced me to make false confessions. They had achieved their objective in showing me their absolute power and publicly assassinate my character. There was no reason to carry on with the detention.
I harboured a hope that they would show their humanity. Every morning when I woke up and realised that I was still in a 2m by 3m cell, I would feel hurt. I told myself “this is the day” I would be released. I could not see them being more cruel than they already were.
Every night, I went to bed disappointed. I spent the whole day waiting to be taken to meet with the ISD officers. And if I met with them, I expected to be told I would be released.
And every night I went to sleep with the knowledge that I was still in a tiny cell, separated from my family. I did not have a life. My whole life was that cell. Nothing else.
And the next day, it went on again. I woke up hoping and expecting to be released and went to bed disappointed that I was not.
I went through this daily routine of hope and disappointment everyday for the first two years. I kept the belief that they would release me, that they were human, they made mistakes but regardless of what they did or said, they were not cruel. The system was flawed but I had faith in their humanity.
When Hafiz said he did not have anything to counsel me anymore, I thought, that was it. I would be released soon. My expectations grew.
I waited for the release. I told Amir and Larsson what Hafiz said. I was happy and optimistic. I asked them when I would be released. I held to the optimism and increased expectations until the next month.
When I met Hafiz in March, he had one specific demand:
“If you keep criticising the government, I will not release you.”
Continued in the next article.