Private lawyer DP Naban will continue to act for the Inland Revenue Board (IRB) in the government's RM1.69 billion tax suit against former prime minister Najib Abdul Razak.
This followed the former finance minister withdrawing his application to disqualify Naban from acting for IRB in the legal action.
This was confirmed by Najib's counsel Muhammad Farhan Muhammad Shafee after he attended the case management of the legal action in the chambers of Kuala Lumpur High Court judge Ahmad Bache this afternoon.
On Nov 8, it was reported that Najib sought to recuse Naban from the legal action, over purported conflict of interest between the said legal practitioner's specialisation in tax-related cases and the current government’s tax suit against Najib.
Speaking to journalists outside the court this afternoon, Farhan said the government, who is the plaintiff in the matter and acting through IRB, gave Najib’s defence team the letter of appointment on Dec 11.
He said Najib initially sought the recusal because the defence did not have details about Naban’s letter of appointment to check whether there was any potential conflict of interest between his (Naban’s) private practice that specialises in tax matters and acting for the IRB in the case.
Farhan added that following the filing of the recusal application, the government shared the letter of appointment with Najib’s legal team.
“After we obtained (Naban’s) letter of appointment and studied it, we decided to withdraw the recusal application.
“At this point, based on perusing through the letter of appointment, we do not see any conflict of interest in the appointment (of Naban to act for IRB),” he said in relation to Naban’s appointment under Section 24(3) of the Government Proceedings Act 1956.
Section 24(3) stated that an advocate and solicitor may appear as an advocate on behalf of the federal government in civil proceedings instituted by the said federal government, among others.
Farhan said Najib had also initially sought to recuse Naban as the IRB seemed as though they did not want to show the letter of appointment to Najib’s legal team during the earlier proceeding on Nov 8, which he said seemed suspicious at the time.
On Nov 8, the scheduled hearing of Najib’s application to stay the entire tax suit pending his tax-reassessment appeal with IRB, as well as IRB’s summary judgment application, did not proceed before the same court, following Najib’s counsel Muhammad Shafee Abdullah informing the court of the intent to file the recusal bid.
Farhan (below) added that the court set Jan 7 for case management to fix hearing dates for Najib’s application to stay the entire suit pending his tax-reassessment appeal with the IRB, as well as IRB’s application for summary judgment against Najib in the main tax suit.
Senior federal counsel Norhisham Ahmad and Al-Hummidallah Idrus appeared for IRB while lawyer Wee Yeong Kang also acted for Najib.
Neither Najib nor Naban was present at court this afternoon.
On Aug 8, Najib had filed the application to stay the tax suit proceedings pending his tax-reassessment appeal with IRB.
The former premier claimed that he had a high chance of winning the appeal to have his taxes reassessed because donations allegedly formed a large portion of the funds from which the RM1.69 billion tax sum was calculated.
Incidentally, on Aug 8, the government, through IRB, had also filed their application for summary judgment against Najib in the tax suit.
Under Malaysia's civil law, summary judgment is a mode to dispose of legal action without going for a full trial, in clear cases where the defendant has no defence against the claim.
In the summary judgment application, the IRB contended that Najib must still pay RM1.69 billion in tax despite his ongoing reassessment appeal with the board.
The government filed the suit against Najib on June 25.
It sought over RM1.69 billion from the former premier, with an annual five percent interest rate beginning from the date of judgment, as well as costs and other relief deemed fit by the court.
In its statement of claim, the government said Najib had failed to pay his income taxes from 2011 to 2017 within the stipulated 30-day period after assessment notices were issued.
As such, the amount owed each year was increased by 10 percent.
It also said that Najib was given 60 days to pay the taxes, together with the 10 percent increase, but still failed to do so.
Following this, Najib was slapped with another five percent increase in the 10 percent hike, bringing the total amount of income tax due to RM1,692,872,924.83.
The final amount owed each year is as follows:
2011: RM134,180,247.10
2012: RM370,674,071.81
2013: RM1,029,767,352.60
2014: RM137,612,077.11
2015: RM19,495,822.53
2016: RM743,179.21
2017: RM400,174.47
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