A petition started by a prominent human rights lawyer urging the king to establish a royal commission of inquiry into the scandalous VK Lingam video will be submitted tomorrow.

Haris Ibrahim when contacted said 4,600 signatures from the public have been collected in the past one month since the campaign began on Sept 25.

Although he wrote the deadline was at 12pm today, signatures were still trickling into his office at press time.

"I don't have the heart to turn them away but I think it is safe to say we have about 4,600 signature at this point in time," he told Malaysiakini.

Haris said the event will be low-key and without any fanfare because the decision to submit the petition tomorrow was made at the eleventh hour

"The submission tomorrow was not planned for. I wanted to collect 5,000 signatures first then fix a date to hand it to the king.

"We wanted to beat the Oct 31 deadline because the Conference of Rulers will be meeting then on whether they will extend the Chief Justice's (Ahmad Fairuz Sheikh Abdul Fairuz) tenure.

"We are hoping the king would then reject the extension and advise the Conference of Rulers based on the petition," he said.

'Hit ground zero'

However, he said he would not be present to hand the petition over tomorrow morning to one of Yang di-Pertuan Agong Sultan Mizan Zainal Abidin's private secretaries.

Asked to explain the reason for the petition, Haris said that the situation has 'hit ground zero'.

"It doesn't look like the executive is showing any effort to address the problem. On that footing, we are taking this to the monarch to set things right," he said.

The Malaysian Bar and civil society has been calling for a royal commission since the controversial eight-minute video surfaced on Sept 19.

The video showed senior lawyer Lingam purportedly fixing judicial appointments and judgments in 2002 with Ahmad Fairuz who was then Chief Judge of Malaya.

Meanwhile, ACA director-general Ahmad Said Hamdan said as long as the original video clip is not obtained, the agency cannot continue its investigations.

Two PKR members and its de facto leader Anwar Ibrahim are under pressure to reveal the two sources of the video clip, but have refused to do so in the absence of iron-clad guarantees of protection for those involved.

Aside from calling for a royal commission to look into the video, the petition also urges the king to direct the prime minister to appoint a tribunal under Article 125 of the Federal Constitution to remove or suspend Ahmad Fairuz and other judges found implicated by misconduct.

It is also requesting for the immediate establishment of an independent judicial commission for the appointment and promotion of judges to the courts.

SPECIAL REPORT: The Lingam tape