Court dismisses Rosmah's appeal to recuse presiding judge in solar case

Summary

• Court of Appeal dismisses Rosmah Mansor’s appeal to recuse the High Court judge who presided over her corruption trial involving the RM1.25 billion solar hybrid project in Sarawak.

• Panel of judges led by Zaidi Ibrahim finds no merit in Rosmah’s contention to support her appeal.

• Rosmah’s lawyers say they will be appealing the court’s decision.

The Court of Appeal has dismissed Rosmah Mansor’s appeal to recuse the High Court judge who presided over her corruption trial involving the RM1.25 billion solar hybrid project in Sarawak.

The wife of former prime minister Najib Abdul Razak had appealed against the decision by the then-High Court judge Zaini Mazlan, who dismissed her application for his recusal in 2022.

Zaini has since been elevated to the Court of Appeal.

This morning, the panel of three judges led by Zaidi Ibrahim found no merit in Rosmah’s contention to support her appeal.

“Having perused the appeal records and heard submissions from both parties, we are of the unanimous view that there is no merit in the appellant’s (Rosmah) appeal before us today.

“We also found that the judge was not wrong in dismissing her recusal application at the material time,” said Zaidi in reading out the panel’s verdict.

Presiding with him were Azman Abdullah and Noorin Badaruddin.

Zaidi further said that Rosmah has also failed to prove the existence of a real danger of bias, as contended in her recusal bid as well as her appeal.

This, he said, is because the documents contended in this matter were significantly different from Zaini’s actual judgment that convicted Rosmah of corruption charges.

“There were two documents, where one is a 71-page opinion draft alleged to have been prepared by the Kuala Lumpur High Court’s research unit and the other is the trial judge’s judgment draft, which was 116 pages.

“Having examined and read both documents, it is clear, in our opinion, that there is indeed a significant difference in the documents.

“This is consistent with the trial judge’s verdict, at the material time, where he said he prepared his own research and judgment without relying on a third party’s opinion,” he said.

Rosmah’s recusal bid in 2022

Rosmah had filed her recusal application, together with a notice of urgency, on Aug 30, 2022, just two days before Zaini was scheduled to deliver his verdict on her corruption case.

The application was filed following the leak of a document, allegedly written by the Kuala Lumpur High Court research unit, regarding her solar case, where she claimed there is a real danger of bias if Zaini did not recuse himself, and that she had lost faith in him following the leak.

The Palace of Justice’s registrar's office had filed a police report over the alleged leak.

On Sept 1, Zaini dismissed her application, where he pointed out that the leaked documents were merely an opinion draft prepared by the unit, and that he never relied on any third-party opinion as he had always done his own research in writing his own judgment.

Later the same day, Zaini convicted Rosmah on all three graft charges and sentenced her to 10 years in jail and a RM970 million fine.

One charge accused Rosmah of soliciting RM187.5 million, and two other counts accused her of receiving bribes of RM6.5 million from Jepak Holdings Sdn Bhd’s former managing director, Saidi Abang Samsuddin, through her former special officer, Rizal Mansor.

It was allegedly done as an inducement to help the company secure the Hybrid Photovoltaic Solar System Integrated Project and Maintenance and Operation of Genset/Diesel for 369 Sarawak rural schools.

Rosmah, however, was granted a stay of execution pending her appeal against Zaini’s decision.

‘Nobody denied leaked document existence’

Rosmah’s counsel confirmed to reporters after today’s proceeding that they will be appealing against today’s decision.

Jagjit Singh, in expressing his disappointment over the verdict, said that the panel did not deal with the core issues raised in their appeal, which were the existence of the leaked documents and that they posed a danger of bias to Rosmah’s case.

“In my perspective, to say we lost the appeal is an understatement. Based on the facts, things should have been done otherwise.”

Akberdin Abdul Kader said Rosmah’s substantive appeal regarding her conviction and sentence will continue to be put on hold, pending the recusal appeal disposal at the Federal Court.

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