Rosmah Mansor’s MySejahtera status today still states that she had close contact with Covid-19.
As a result, today’s scheduled solar energy corruption trial of the wife of former prime minister Najib Abdul Razak was unable to proceed.
On Wednesday, proceedings before the Kuala Lumpur High Court involving her graft trial linked to the solar hybrid energy project for 369 rural schools in Sarawak, was vacated due to her being unable to enter court due to her orange MySejahtera status.
During proceedings before judge Mohamed Zaini Mazlan this morning, defence counsel Jagjit Singh informed that the accused was unable to enter the Kuala Lumpur Courts Complex due to her MySejahtera close contact status.
“I understand that this morning, her status was verified by the court registrar,” the lawyer said when the judge asked whether her MySejahtera status has reverted to blue (low risk).
Jagjit explained that the court registrar, Catherine Nicholas, went down to Rosmah’s vehicle parked outside the Kuala Lumpur Courts Complex, and verified that her MySejahtera status was orange.
Deputy public prosecutor Gopal Sri Ram then suggested that today’s criminal court proceedings be converted to hybrid online proceedings, per provisions under the law.
“I suggest we proceed with hybrid online proceedings, whereby she can testify from her home,” the former federal court judge suggested.
No provision
Earlier on Tuesday and Wednesday this week, the Court of Appeal at the Palace of Justice, Putrajaya, carried out hybrid online criminal proceedings related to Najib’s RM42 million SRC International corruption appeal.
The proceedings saw the Court of Appeal judges and prosecution team being present at the Palace of Justice, while Najib and his defence team followed proceedings via Zoom from another location.
The Court of Appeal hybrid online proceedings was due to Najib and large numbers of his defence team coming in close contact with a Covid-19 positive person.
During today’s High Court criminal proceedings, Zaini expressed reservations regarding the proposed hybrid online proceedings due to uncertainty whether there are provisions that allow this.
“I was going to suggest it (hybrid online criminal proceedings), but I would like to be more cautious,” the judge said, adding that his perusal of the statutes did not seem to show a provision allowing this.
Hybrid online method
Zaini then vacated proceedings to Monday next week, directing Jagjit to check again Rosmah’s Mysejahtera status whether it has reverted to blue.
Since the Covid-19 outbreak hit Malaysian shores last year, the civil jurisdiction courts in Malaysia have conducted many case managements and hearings fully online.
However, by comparison, the Malaysian criminal jurisdiction courts generally still try, for the most part, to conduct trials in open court rather than online or even via a hybrid online method.
For the current solar graft trial before the High Court, Rosmah, 70, is facing three charges under Section 16(a)(A) of the MACC Act 2009.
On the first charge, she is accused of soliciting RM187.5 million in bribes from Jepak Holdings Sdn Bhd to help secure an Education Ministry project.
The RM1.25 billion project was intended to supply power to 369 rural schools in Sarawak using a combination of solar and diesel energy.
On the second and third charges, she is accused of receiving RM1.5 million and RM5 million in bribes respectively as a reward for securing the project.
On Feb 18 this year, the High Court ordered Rosmah to enter her defence, following its finding that the prosecution succeeded in establishing a prima facie case against her.
Besides Monday next week, the other dates fixed for Rosmah’s solar corruption trials are Dec 23 and 24 this year, as well as Jan 10 to 14 and Feb 4 next year. - Mkini
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