Najib’s final SRC appeal to begin tomorrow
The Federal Court has set nine days from tomorrow to hear the former prime minister’s appeal to be acquitted and to set aside the 12-year jail term and RM210 million fine in the graft case.
Initially set for 10 days, the apex court...
All eyes will be on the apex court tomorrow as it hears Najib Abdul Razak’s final avenue of appeal to quash his conviction and jail sentence in the RM42 million SRC International corruption case.
The Federal Court has set nine days from tomorrow to hear the former prime minister’s appeal to be acquitted and to set aside the 12-year jail term and RM210 million fine in the graft case.
Initially set for 10 days, the apex court later took out a day, leaving nine days for the hearing from Aug 15 to 19 and Aug 23 to 26.
The Federal Court has also fixed tomorrow to first hear the former finance minister’s application to adduce fresh evidence to nullify his conviction and get a retrial.
The basis of Najib’s fresh evidence bid was that SRC trial judge Mohd Nazlan Mohd Ghazali had a conflict of interest due to his previous tenure as general counsel at Maybank.
The allegation of conflict of interest centred on the commercial bank’s purported role in the formation of SRC as well as a loan to Malaysian sovereign wealth fund 1MDB.
Formerly a subsidiary of 1MDB, SRC is now fully owned by the Minister of Finance Incorporated (MOF Inc).
Despite having officially withdrawn his bribery claims against Nazlan, the former premier stuck to his guns over the purported conflict of interest against Nazlan.
The former Kuala Lumpur High Court judge has since been elevated to the Court of Appeal.
Main SRC appeal
In the event that the apex court dismisses the fresh evidence bid, it would proceed to then hear the main SRC appeal.
The Federal Court proceedings would also be closely watched due to the recent issue of whether Najib’s new legal team would stick with him or discharge themselves in the event that the apex court proceeds to hear the main appeal.
Back on July 29, the apex court denied a bid by the former prime minister’s legal team - from Zaid Ibrahim Suflan TH Liew & Partners - to postpone the appeal hearing.
This new batch of lawyers took over from that of law firm Shafee & Co (however, Shafee & Co is still representing Najib in other court cases linked to SRC and 1MDB).
However, the newly chosen firm - founded by former de facto law minister Zaid Ibrahim - denied they would discharge themselves from representing Najib in the appeal.
Previously, the former premier’s legal team filed its petition of appeal containing 94 grounds.
They include that the lower courts used their own logic and rationale in contravention of evidence that exonerated the former premier from one count of abuse of power, three counts of criminal breach of trust (CBT), and three money laundering charges.
Last month, Najib failed in a bid to get court leave for a Queen’s Counsel from the United Kingdom (UK) to represent him in the SRC appeal.
On July 28, 2020, the Kuala Lumpur High Court found Najib guilty of the seven criminal charges involving RM42 million of funds from SRC.
Having meted out the sentence, Nazlan however allowed the defence’s bid to stay the execution of the sentence pending disposal of the appeal.
On Dec 8 last year, the Court of Appeal upheld the lower court’s ruling and dismissed Najib’s appeal.
Najib also used to be SRC’s adviser emeritus and chairperson of 1MDB’s board of advisers.
Case postpone because lead lawyer forgot to set his alarm and overslept and slipped in the jamban and broke his eye in several places and is unable to see the sun. Very novel medical chit signed by Dr Shifty.
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