I refer to your report 'I was told to strip twice, sole woman ISA detainee tells Suhakam' (June 19). I thought the Internal Security Act was to prevent subversion by militants like KMM operatives. I did not know that in the eyes of the higher echelons of law enforcement authorities, "subversion and national security" extended to "falsifying travel documents and being involved in the trafficking and recruitment of foreign women migrant workers to work in local nightspots" as alleged of the sole female ISA detainee, Ng Chooi Choon, 56, detained on Jan 25 last year.

If this were the case, just about every offence and misdemeanor can be construed as coming within the ambit of threat to national security.

I also did not know a female detainee, even a 56-year-old mother of three, could be subject to the indignity of being ordered by the police to strip for a "look".

Maybe had she being younger, she might even have been raped. (This is not impossible. I remember sometime back it was reported in The Star of a court case where a Filipino woman alleged she was raped in the Ampang police station).

What is happening to our police force? (Former ISA detainee) Irene Xavier had in an earlier letter to malaysiakini also disclosed other forms of emotional and psychological humiliation in the hands of authorities.

The Home Ministry should weed out the black sheep and shape up the standards of behaviour of the police personnel or ship out this responsibility to private sector.

Police cannot behave like organised "legal gangsters" going around to prey on the weak such as illegals, vendors of pirated software, motorbikers in the hope that under guise of enforcing the law, they get bribed instead.

If the government cannot improve the quality of law enforcement authorities then it should not arrogate unto itself the sole executive power to detain persons under ISA that is beyond the courts' review on the basis only of reports prepared by such law enforcement authorities.

When the public image of law enforcement is already tainted by disclosure of abuse, how could we trust our liberty and freedom and their curtailment to the executive relying on reports of such law enforcement officers to detain without trial?

When we know the police does not know the distinction in terms of threat to national security between a pimp that trafficks women to night spots and a militant bent on exploding some bomb? When we hear stories like the police enjoying a free show of a 56-year-old female ISA detainee?

This kind of behaviour just does not inspire confidence in the professionalism and impartiality of personnel making reports that Home Ministry relies to decide on detention of persons under ISA that the courts cannot even go behind and review — and act as a check against encroachment of citizen's freedom.

For God's sake, if the government cannot run law enforcement with competence and standards, please privatise or corporatise this department (like the way it did for postal services, telecommuncation or the national airline) to some businessman cronies or public-listed company.

The worse that can happen is perhaps the cronies fail in the project but at least for the time being there might be an improvement in standards of recruitment, and service with better public relations and less abuse of police power.