Umno info chief: Pakatan’s failures laid bare in special task force report on probe into ex-AG Thomas’ memoir

KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 22 — The special task force report on former attorney general (AG) Tan Sri Tommy Thomas’ book My Story: Justice in the Wilderness revealed the failure of Pakatan Harapan (PH) when the coalition was in government, claimed an Umno leader today.

Umno information chief Shahril Hamdan said the report revealed that PH had turned its back on the coalition’s call to improve governance, a pledge made during the previous 14th general election (GE14).

He said that during the GE14 campaign, PH said it wanted to reduce the abuse of power and interference in the judiciary, among other transgressions.

“However, today another PH failure has been revealed.

“It is now clear that a procedure and law made during Pak Lah’s (Tun Abdullah Ahmad Badawi) time to strengthen the judicial system and the separation of powers between the executive and judicial branches was set aside arbitrarily,” said Shahril in a statement today.

He was commenting on the special task force report that gave a damning appraisal of Thomas’ conduct as AG.

Ahead of the 15th general election (GE15), Shahril said PH are peddling similar slogans, claiming that it is clean, reformist, sincere and people oriented.

“The coalition accused Umno of wanting to win, so we can interfere in court cases,” he said.

Shahril said the investigation report, which can be downloaded from the website of the Legal Division of the Prime Minister’s Department, revealed that Thomas, who was appointed as AG when PH came to power, was involved in various dubious actions.

“The most obvious was the appointment of the judicial institution’s highest office holders in July 2018.

“The appointed individuals were agreed upon during confidential discussions between Thomas and then prime minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad,” he said.

Shahril listed the appointments of the chief justice, the president of the Court of Appeal, the chief justice of the High Court of Malaya and the chief justice of the High Court of Sabah and Sarawak.

“This conflicts with the provisions of the law, particularly the Judicial Appointments Commission Act where — as highlighted in pages 38 to 40 of the special task force report — a prime minister does not have the authority to select judge candidates for the courts as above,” he said.

Yesterday, the government declassified and published the findings of a special investigation into Thomas’ memoir.

Publication of the report, by a special task force, came a week after caretaker prime minister Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob said it would be made public.