Chief Justice Zaki Azmi has called on lawyers to cooperate with the judiciary to make a success of the newly-launched audio conferencing system.

Otherwise, he said, it would revert to the old practice, adding that the judiciary would be no worse-off by using the conventional method of case management.

“So, lawyers, please come up with some good words for the judiciary. I have repeatedly invited you to come and see us if you have any problem, email, sms or write to us,” he said when launching the Audio Conferencing for Courts in Malaysia at the Court Complex in Jalan Duta, Kuala Lumpur today.

zaki azmi and malaysia palace of justice judiciary The audio conferencing will enable lawyers to simultaneously communicate, via telephone, with the court registrars.

Zaki ( left ) pointed out that the judiciary had investigated all legitimate complaints and tried to put it right, stressing that if any part of the new system was not right, he would be the first to feel embarrassed.

He said that over the last two years, the judiciary had introduced so many innovations, most of which were “home grown”, and others copied from overseas to further improve the efficiency of the court system and reduce the backlog of cases.

“These new facilities do not benefit the judge, magistrate and registrar as much as they do the lawyers and their clients...and I continuously look for ways to further improve, and will continue to do so, for so long as I am here,” he added.

Zaki said the system dealt with case management, mention to get a hearing date, show-cause hearing and inter-court communication which benefited lawyers, as well as the court, as it would take less time and the cases, easier to manage and less rigid.

“With this telephonic conferencing installed, lawyers can do their case management in the comfort of their office. They save the trouble of having to struggle through the traffic jams which are becoming worse by the day, just to spend two minutes to get a hearing date,” he said.

‘New system saves cost and time’

With the new system, he said it would save litigation cost, eliminate waiting period, save time and costs travelling to courts.

Zaki also said that the court's system could improve more, if the Internet was also improved, adding that the judiciary could have the electronic filing system practised in Singapore where documents were filed from the lawyer’s office.

However, he said, it could not be done in Malaysia as the court received up to 1,500 writ summonses, applications and other correspondences daily, which would crash even before taking off.

At a press conference later, Zaki explained that the system had been implemented at the Federal Court, Court of Appeal and High Court in the country since last Monday.

A total of 174 of court registrars in the country were supplied with the new service provided by Maxis.

On the total cost of the system, Maxis senior vice-president M Fitri Abdullah said there was no monthly subscription fee for the service but it was a pay-per-use service of RM2 per conference and RM5 for recording.

Currently, the conference could include up to 10 participants.

On other issues, Zaki dismissed a lawyer’s opinion that the Federal Court had currently denied their leave to appeal.

Refusing to answer the question, he said: “I don't want to answer the question. Yesterday, I gave leave to the lawyer. It depends on the merit, if they got merit for leave to appeal, the court will give.”

He said in order to obtain leave, the appellant must fulfill the requirement under Section 96 of the Courts of Judicature Act 1964, for the court to grant the leave.

Zaki said, lawyers who lost their cases would always blame the court, but if they won a case, they would say the judge was good.

- Bernama