Najib Abdul Razak is allowed to attend his appeal hearing tomorrow over a civil court denial of his bid to disqualify Tommy Thomas’ law firm from acting for the former attorney-general against the former prime minister’s wrongful prosecution suit.
A three-person Court of Appeal bench chaired by Kamaludin Md Said permitted the application by the former finance minister’s counsel Firoz Hussein Ahmad Jamaluddin during Zoom proceedings this morning.
As a result, the Kajang Prison officers would produce Najib (above) for the physical Court of Appeal hearing tomorrow on his appeal against the verdict of the High Court in Kuala Lumpur on Aug 19 last year, which dismissed his application to prevent law firm Tommy Thomas from representing Thomas.
Najib also has a pending appeal before the Court of Appeal on Oct 4 over the High Court’s decision on Nov 25 last year to throw out his main civil action against Thomas over alleged malicious prosecution linked to the 1MDB financial scandal.
During the online proceedings also presided by appellate bench member judges Lim Chong Fong and Azizul Azmin Adnan, Firoz informed the panel that it is necessary for Najib be allowed to attend the disqualification appeal tomorrow so that the appellant can relay proper instructions to his legal team.
Kamaludin then relayed the unanimous ruling to allow the ex-parte application for Najib to attend the Court of Appeal proceedings physically tomorrow.
An ex-parte application is one where the hearing is done with only the participation of one party in proceedings (Najib) and without the presence of the other side (Thomas).
On Aug 19 last year, in denying Najib’s disqualification bid, High Court judge Ahmad Bache ruled that it is trite, particularly in common law and in practice, that a litigant such as Thomas has the right to choose a solicitor of his own choice.
Later on Nov 25 last year, Ahmad allowed Thomas’ application to strike out Najib’s entire civil action, on grounds that the lawsuit was ‘filled with unconnected political issues” and lacked details on the former attorney-general’s alleged involvement in wrongful prosecution.
Najib’s lawsuit centred on Thomas’ alleged wrongful prosecution against him in four criminal cases.
Three of the cases are ongoing, namely the RM2.28 billion 1MDB corruption case, the RM6.6 billion International Petroleum Investment Company (IPIC) criminal breach of trust (CBT) case, and the RM27 million SRC International money-laundering case.
The fourth one is the 1MDB audit case, for which Najib has been granted a full acquittal by the High Court in Kuala Lumpur. The prosecution, however, went to the Court of Appeal to quash this ruling.
The civil suit, however, is not over the RM42 million SRC corruption case (a separate case from the RM27 million SRC money-laundering case), for which Najib is serving a 12-year jail sentence.
Ahmad, among others, ruled that Najib’s civil action failed to state why and how the prosecution in the said criminal cases was not in accordance with the law.
Ahmad noted that Thomas, as then attorney-general, was under a public duty to prosecute the plaintiff after investigating agencies had provided the defendant with all necessary evidence, following thorough investigations. - Mkini
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