Appeals court upholds decision on 5 UM students

PUTRAJAYA: The Court of Appeal today upheld a High Court decision which had overturned the University of Malaya’s (UM) disciplinary action against five of its fstudents for their involvement in a talk featuring Anwar Ibrahim in October, 2014.

A three-man bench comprising Justices David Wong Dak Wah, Yaacob Md Sam and Zabariah Mohd Yusof unanimously dismissed the appeal brought by the university’s students’ disciplinary committee, its appeals committee, its board of directors, its treasurer and the university.

The appeal was dismissed with cost which was set at RM2,000.

Wong, who chaired the panel, held that there was no appealable error made by the High Court judge.

The decision was made after submissions by Mubashir Mansor, who represented UM.

Wong said the court need not hear the submission from New Sin Yew who represented the students.

On July 29, 2016, the Shah Alam High Court had allowed a judicial review filed by the students against the disciplinary committee that found them guilty on disciplinary charges and had imposed either a suspension, a fine or a stern warning.

The students – former Persatuan Mahasiswa Universiti Malaya (PMUM) president Fahmi Zainol and his then committee members, Safwan Shamsuddin, Adam Fistival Wilfrid, Haw Yu Hong and Khairol Najib Hashim – graduated last year and this year.
The university had suspended Fahmi for two semesters and fined him RM600, Safwan was suspended for one semester and fined RM300, Adam and Haw were each fined RM150 and Khairol was reprimanded.

The five took the matter to the High Court for a judicial review against the board’s decision.

The High Court, in allowing their judicial review application to quash the board’s decision, had ruled that the disciplinary proceedings were not conducted in accordance with the UM disciplinary rules (Kaedah-Kaedah Universiti Malaya Tatatertib Pelajar-Pelajar 1997).

Mubashir later told reporters outside the court that he would seek instructions from his clients on whether to bring the matter to the Federal Court. -FMT