May 10 hearing for Najib, Nazifuddin leave bid to appeal unpaid tax ruling

Lawyer Wee Yeong Kang, who is representing Najib and Nazifuddin, told reporters this after a case management here today.

The case management was conducted before Federal Court deputy registrar Rasidah Roslee and was attended by Wee, counsel Sakinah Najwa Hussin for the Inland Revenue Board (IRB) and lawyer Abhilaash Subramaniam appearing for the Malaysian Bar acting as amicus curiae (friend of the court) in the tax cases.

According to Wee, the court yesterday allowed an application by the IRB counsel for an adjournment of the hearing which was scheduled to be held on Feb 16.

He said IRB had applied for the adjournment on Feb 8 after one of its counsel had tested positive for COVID-19.

The former prime minister and his son are seeking for leave to file the appeal against the summary judgement obtained by IRB to recover more than RM1.7 billion in tax arrears from them.

Two separate High Courts had allowed the IRB's applications to enter summary judgment to recover tax arrears of RM1.69 billion from Najib and RM37.6 million from Nazifuddin, for the period between 2011 and 2017.

A summary judgment is obtained when the court decides on a case through written submissions without a full trial and calling witnesses.

Both Najib and Nazifuddin lost their appeal in the Court of Appeal in September last year to set aside the summary judgment.

The appellate court, however, granted the applications by both men to temporarily halt (interim stay) the summary judgment order pending hearing of their leave to appeal application before the Federal Court.

In civil cases, litigants must first obtain leave before they can proceed with their appeals in the Federal Court.