Motion on CJ rejected twice in 24 hrs

DAP stalwart Karpal Singh's emergency motion to debate newly-appointed Chief Justice Zaki Azmi's alleged 'bribery admission' has been rejected for the second time in 24 hours.

The latest rejection was delivered to Karpal through a formal letter early this morning.

In the letter, Dewan Rakyat Speaker Pandikar Amin Mulia cited Article 127 of the federal constitution and the Parliament standing order 36(8) as the reasons for the rejection.

Standing order 36(8) and Article 127 prohibit the discussion of the conduct of any judges in Parliament unless the motion was moved by one-fourth of the MPs in the Dewan.

Speaking at a press conference later, Karpal said he was not questioning the conduct of Zaki as chief justice but rather when he was a lawyer.

Therefore, he added, this invalidates the reasons cited by the speaker.

"This matter cannot be put to rest or dismissed. It must be taken further as we are talking about the integrity of the judiciary. The rejection of the motion means I have to lodge a police report," he said.

Later, Karpal confirmed that he would be lodging a police report at the Jalan Tun HS Lee police station tomorrow afternoon.

In-depth investigation required

Yesterday, the same motion was rejected on technical grounds leading the Bukit Gelugor MP to re-file it again.

In his motion, the opposition politician accused the chief justice of "committing a serious offence under the Prevention of Corruption Act 1981".

In view of this, he said the matter requires an in-depth investigation.

Previously, Zaki was reported as saying that he encountered first-hand experience of corruption problems in the court and as a lawyer was 'blacklisted' in 1987 for complaining to the chief registrar of two missing files belonging to his clients.

"It took me six months to be nice, to bribe each and every individual to get back into their good books before our files were being unattended to," he was quoted as saying by the New Straits Times .

A day later, the English-daily issued a clarification by the chief justice in reference to the above statement.

"Your reporter must have interpreted what I said, which is that during that period there was corruption in order to get things done at the court registry, as I myself having done it.

"I have never in my life bribed or received any bribe," he told the newspaper.

However, Karpal said although Zaki made the clarification, he still finds him "unfit and improper to be appointed as CJ".

Speaker defends himself

Commenting on the rejection, Pandikar defended his action and dismissed the allegation that he was acting partially.

"I have given my reason for the rejection. Under the standing order and Article 127, the conduct of judges cannot be discussed in Parliament but it can be debated should one-fourth of MPs in the Dewan move a motion to debate the matter.

"What I don't understand is that the MPs know of this rule but yet they fail to utilise it," he told a press conference in his office.

The speaker also said he could not accept Karpal's argument that the DAP MP was questioning the conduct of Zaki when he was a lawyer.

He argued that although Karpal had questioned the conduct of Zaki as a lawyer, the speaker believes that the debate would eventually lead to the debate on the appointment of Zaki as chief justice.

On the perception that he is biased given his track record of '100 percent rejection' of emergency motions filed by opposition MPs, Pandikar said he did not care about people’s impressions.

The speaker stressed that he was "only concerned about upholding the rules of parliamentary proceedings."

Explaining further, Pandikar said it was always opposition MPs, and not their BN counterparts, who submitted emergency motions and therefore giving the impression of impartiality.

For the speaker to approve the tabling of an emergency motion, the motion must meet three criteria - be of public importance, be of a specific matter and be an urgent matter.

Opposition motions are often rejected by Pandikar on the third criteria and when quizzed on this, the speaker replied: "The matters raised by opposition MPs in their emergency motions have been spoken, mentioned and have been answered before in normal proceedings."

"So where is the urgency?" he asked.