KUALA LUMPUR, April 26 — Attorney General (AG) Tan Sri Idrus Harun has come out to quash accusations of him not doing enough as the government’s top legal advisor to ensure even-handed implementation of the law during this period of the Covid-19 pandemic. 

In a stinging response to an article by Eliminating Deaths and Abuse in Custody Together (EDICT), Idrus clarified that he had been regularly issuing guidelines and directives to deputy public prosecutors (DPPs) and those within his Chambers (AGC), who he underscored are also governed by their Code of Ethics. 

"On 9 April 2020, EDICT Malaysia posted an article on their website entitled ‘The Attorney General must rein in prosecutors’. 

"In that article, EDICT claimed that unlike other institutions involved in the administration of justice, the Attorney General’s Chambers has failed to issue any guidelines to prosecutors to ensure even-handed implementation and enforcement of the movement control order (MCO).

"EDICT appears to have made the erroneous assumption that just because they have not sighted any directives or guidelines by the Attorney General, therefore, there must be none. As stated earlier, this is completely not true. 

"AGC, being a public institution, welcomes criticisms of its actions provided always they are constructive and based on facts duly established and not on conjecture and diatribe which are clearly not fact-checked,” Idrus wrote in a statement today. 

He elaborated saying cases involving breaches of the MCO have and are being monitored daily by the Prosecution Division head and his deputy, with DPPs required to file daily reports of related cases to Idrus’ office. 

DPPs, he pointed out, have been reminded to give particular attention to cases involving juveniles to ensure they are not remanded, unless absolutely unavoidable, while ensuring they are treated according to the Child Act, in a Court for Children. 

"That said, it must be remembered that some matters, like remands and sentencing, are not powers within the purview therefore control of the Attorney General. 

"The actions and decisions of the Attorney General, as well as those of the DPPs, are based on powers and responsibilities conferred by the Federal Constitution and the law,” he said. 

EDICT had in their article alleged that the AG was lax in issuing directives to prosecutors to indicate changes in the process of enforcement during a time of the pandemic. 

Their article, a follow up to an open letter also penned by EDICT to Idrus, pointed out how other public institutions involved in the administration of justice, such as the Prison Department, and the Chief Justice, Chief Judge of Malaya and Chief Judge of Sabah and Sarawak had all ordered directives sensitive to the MCO.