May 23 hearing for Najib, Shafee’s leave to appeal bid to disqualify Sri Ram

The applications by Najib Razak and lawyer Muhammad Shafee Abdullah for leave to appeal against the dismissal of their judicial review challenge to disqualify Gopal Sri Ram from leading the prosecution in their cases will be heard by the Federal Court on May 23.

This was confirmed by the deputy head of the Civil Division in the Attorney-General’s Chambers, Shamsul Bolhassan, when contacted by Bernama.

Case management was conducted before Federal Court deputy registrar Fadzlin Abd Zawawi yesterday and attended by lawyer Sarah Abishegam representing Najib and Shafee. Federal counsel Nur Syazwani Abdul Aziz appeared for the government of Malaysia, the prosecution and Sri Ram.

According to Shamsul, the deputy registrar had allowed an extension of time until May 17 for Najib and Shafee’s applications, for the filing of written submissions.

On Nov 8 last year, the former prime minister and Shafee lost their appeals in the Court of Appeal to disqualify Sri Ram as senior deputy public prosecutor in their respective cases.

On Aug 28, 2020, the High Court in Kuala Lumpur dismissed the judicial review applications by Najib and Shafee to remove the former Federal Court judge as senior deputy public prosecutor in their cases.

Najib filed the judicial review application to disqualify Sri Ram as the senior deputy public prosecutor in his 1MDB-linked cases in December 2018.

Shafee, who is Najib’s lawyer, also filed for a judicial review as he too was seeking to recuse Sri Ram from his RM9.5 million money laundering trial.

The duo sought a court order to revoke Sri Ram’s appointment or recuse him, saying that his letter of appointment was invalid.

They also wanted a declaration that there was a conflict of interest in Sri Ram’s appointment, and an order to prohibit him from leading the prosecution team in all of their cases, including on corruption, abuse of power and money laundering.