There is no political interference in the Inland Revenue Board’s bankruptcy proceedings against former prime minister Najib Abdul Razak, the board’s legal representative submitted today.
Senior revenue counsel Norhisham Ahmad told the High Court in Kuala Lumpur that the ongoing bankruptcy proceedings against Najib is just part of the IRB’s normal process to execute court judgment in tax suits.
“There is no political interference. We waited since July last year and did nothing with the (summary) judgment (against Najib in an RM1.69 billion tax suit).
“People would say we did nothing with the judgment. We need to do something with the judgment.
“When we get a judgment, we need to execute the judgment. This is what we have been doing since we have the income tax (law),” Norhisham said.
He was submitting during online proceedings of Najib’s application to stay the High Court’s summary judgment in the government’s RM1.69 billion tax suit against the former prime minister.
Norhisham was counter-submitting before judge Ahmad Bache for the dismissal of Najib’s stay application.
Najib is seeking the stay in order to temporarily prevent the IRB from proceeding with the bankruptcy proceedings against him, pending the disposal of his related appeal at the Court of Appeal.
On July 22 last year, the High Court allowed the IRB’s application for summary judgment in its RM1.69 billion tax suit against Najib.
In effect, this meant that the High Court allowed IRB’s tax suit against Najib, without undergoing a full trial where witnesses need to testify.
Najib has an appeal pending at the Court of Appeal against the summary judgment ruling. That appeal is set to be heard by the Court of Appeal on June 16.
On April 8, Najib’s lead counsel Muhammad Shafee Abdullah described the bankruptcy proceedings against the former prime minister as politically driven.
On June 2, Najib filed an application to set aside the bankruptcy notice, which was served on him on April 5.
Norhisham’s arguments today were in response to Shafee’s submissions during the same proceedings today that the bankruptcy proceedings were only initiated against Najib earlier this year, following a rift between Umno and other members of the present Perikatan Nasional (PN) administration.
The lawyer claimed that following the summary judgment ruling delivered on July 22, there were months-long stretches where Najib’s legal team had been in discussion with a related department of the Finance Ministry on how to resolve the issue of tax reassessment, among others (the IRB is among multiple entities that fall within the purview of the Finance Ministry).
Shafee claimed that they had even received a letter from the Finance Ministry late last year, which seemed to indicate that the discussion was progressing well for both sides at first.
“This was all going very well until a political development because Umno decided to pull out, or something like that. Then two, days later, he (Najib) got the bankruptcy notice. Prior to that, there was no such thing,” Shafee submitted.
The lawyer added that a stay was necessary because even if Najib obtains a favourable ruling for his appeal at the Court of Appeal later, such an appeal outcome may be rendered nugatory (useless or futile) if the bankruptcy matter still proceeded against Najib.
After the parties completed their submissions this afternoon, judge Ahmad fixed Monday next week for the decision on Najib’s application to stay the summary judgment. - Mkini
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