The Federal Court today denied leave to the Bar Council and two others to appeal to strike out a civil suit against them and to revoke an injunction to stop a proposed extraordinary general meeting (EGM) which was to be held last November.

This ruling endorses a Court of Appeal decision which ruled that individuals and organisations are not allowed to discuss the conduct of the judiciary openly as it would be unconstitutional.

The dismissal of the leave application effectively closes the door to the final venue of appeal for the defendants - the Bar council, the Malaysian Bar and former Bar Council chairman RR Chelvarajah.

The Federal Court panel, comprising Court of Appeal president Lamin Yunus, Chief Judge of Malaya Wan Adnan Wan Ismail and Chief Judge of Sabah and Sarawak Steve Shim, held that the application by the defendants "had no merits".

Summarily dismissed

The application was dismissed summarily with costs. The issue before the court today was a leave application by the defendants to appeal against the two decisions of the Court of Appeal which upheld a High Court decision in dismissing their application to strike out the suit and in granting the injunction to lawyer K Rajasegaran.

Rajasegaran had sought an injunction and obtained it on Nov 19 last year to stop the defendants from holding the EGM the next day to discuss allegations pertaining to the judiciary as contained in an affidavit filed by Asian Wall Street Journal correspondent Raphael Pura in a defamation suit filed against him by two companies.

In his suit, Rajasegaran claimed that the defendants had acted ultra vires of the Legal Profession Act 1976 by calling for the EGM to discuss allegations pertaining to the judiciary.

Rajasegaran had claimed that by calling for the EGM and to discuss the proposed resolution calling for a Royal Commission of Inquiry to investigate the judiciary, the defendants had acted in a manner which was seditious, contemptuous and an abuse of their powers.

On July 12 this year, the Court of Appeal heard the applications by the defendants against the striking out and the injunction and unanimously dismissed the appeals with costs.

No public discussions

The appellate court had held that any discussion into the conduct of judges or any allegations of impropriety of judges must only be done in accordance with Articles 125 and 127 of the Federal Constitution.

Articles 125 and 127 provide for the provisions relating to the misconduct of judges and the procedures to follow, such as setting up of a tribunal, to address that issue.

Court of Appeal judge Justice Ahmad Fairuz Sheikh Abdul Halim said he was in full agreement with Justices Mokhtar Sidin and Denis Ong that there would be no point in having these two articles if such conduct could be discussed in other forums.

The court said that "no other forum or platform was available for discussion of the conduct of a Judge, much less a Bar Council or group of practising advocates."

The Court of Appeal noted that "they (the Bar Council) are prohibited to discuss the conduct of a judge in the discharge of his duties or to pass any resolution in that behalf".

This constitutional pronouncement by the Court of Appeal will remain as it was not overturned by the Federal Court in its ruling today.

The Court of Appeal had also held that it was satisfied that there were serious questions to be tried in the matter and that the High Court was right in granting the injunction.