That's not cool, Anwar tells Najib

Anwar Ibrahim has described Najib Abdul Razak's application to set aside his subpoena as “not cool”, giving short shrift to the premier's bid to achieve an image makeover.

Prior to this, Najib had said he would testify in the Sodomy II trial if subpoenaed, also indicating that he dares to face Anwar in court.

"Now he is filing the application to have it set aside ... why shy away?" asked Anwar, who is defending himself against the charge based on a complaint by his former aide Mohd Saiful Bukhari Azlan in 2008.

"Everybody knows Saiful met him at his residence and now he is trying to shy away. Of course this will delay matters and we have to deal with it. Such actions by Najib are uncool," he quipped.

Anwar said Najib is resorting to the same tactic that former premier Dr Mahathir Mohamad used in 1998.

"Najib has to answer as to the meeting - which he initially denied took place but then admitted (to having held with Saiful)."

His wife and PKR president Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail also described Najib's action as "not cool".

Speaking on the matter after the Pakatan Rakyat leadership council meeting later, Anwar noted that Najib was in fact going back on his word when he met the PKR man's lawyers last month.

“(Najib) had promised... (he said) that he did not want to cooperate with (my) lawyers but if he was subpoenaed then he will turn up,” he said.

Najib and Rosmah had met with Anwar's lawyer Sankara Nair on Aug 12, but refused to be interviewed as they did not want to be defence witnesses.

Najib, 58, has highlighted how he uses social media like Facebookand Twitter to engage with youth. Yesterday, he took part in threeradio programmes during which he projected a relaxed image.

Last Saturday, he attended the SuaraKami concert, which he yesterday described as "awesome", "great" and "sempoi", a popular Malay word that means 'simple', 'laid back' or 'cool'.

Additional reporting by Aidila Razak