Najib, Shafee's appeal hearing to disqualify Sri Ram as senior DPP re-set to Sept 23

PUTRAJAYA: The Court of Appeal has re-set to Sept 23 for hearing of the appeals by Datuk Seri Najib Razak and his lawyer, Tan Sri Muhammad Shafee Abdullah, against a High Court's dismissal of their judicial review applications to disqualify Datuk Seri Gopal Sri Ram as senior deputy public prosecutor (DPP) in their respective court cases.

Senior federal counsel Shamsul Bolhassan informed the date when contacted by Bernama today.

The appeals came up for case management before Court of Appeal deputy registrar Mariam Hasanah Othman today.

The court had previously fixed June 17 to hear the appeals.

On Aug 28 last year, the High Court in Kuala Lumpur dismissed the judicial review applications brought by the former Prime Minister and Muhammad Shafee to remove the former Federal Court judge (Sri Ram) as senior DPP in their respective cases.

High Court judge Datuk Seri Mariana Yahya (now Court of Appeal judge) ruled that the appointment of Sri Ram, as senior DPP by then Attorney-General (AG) Tan Sri Tommy Thomas, was valid.

"It is clear that the AG had made a careful consideration before appointing Sri Ram as a senior DPP to spearhead the prosecution relating to 1MDB scandal based on Sri Ram's vast experience in the legal field," said Justice Mariana when she dismissed the judicial review applications by Najib and Muhammad Shafee.

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

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

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

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

-- BERNAMA