KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 10 — Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s lead defence lawyer appeared to cast doubt on a news report yesterday by Channel News Asia (CNA) which had speculated that a royal pardon decision on the former prime minister is expected soon.
Najib’s lawyer Tan Sri Muhammad Shafee Abdullah pointed out that even his client is “clueless” about the claims made in CNA’s report and said the pardons process is carried out in secrecy in line with the Official Secrets Act (OSA).
“We as lawyers for Datuk Seri Najib who are involved in the petition for his pardon have never been informed (consistent with all other cases) of the steps taken by the Pardons Board (if any) pertaining to our client’s petition for pardon.
“We are therefore left dumbfounded as to how CNA has speculated this unfounded news. We do not know who are the unnamed sources that CNA and Leslie Lopez had relied on for such a sensational story that has preoccupied the public and the press this morning,” Shafee said in a four-page statement today.
Shafee said his press statement was made in response to local and foreign reporters who had requested for clarification regarding the CNA report.
Shafee referred specifically to the CNA report’s suggestion that there would be a decision soon whether a royal pardon would be granted to Najib, and that the Pardons Board had allegedly met in December 2023 on Najib’s petition for pardon and had allegedly deferred the matter to this month to be looked at.
Shafee however said every Pardons Board sitting is conducted at “high-level secrecy”, and that the dates when the Pardons Board meets and the names of the Pardons Board’s “variable members” or non-permanent members are not publicised.
While the Pardons Board for the Federal Territories (since Najib’s case is in the Federal Territories and would come under it) has its permanent members as the Yang di-Pertuan Agong, the federal territories minister and the attorney general, Shafee said the names of the variable members that make up the rest of the Pardons Board are “always kept secret and never disclosed”.
“It is obvious therefore, if the Pardons Board were to assemble to consider Datuk Seri Najib’s application for his pardon, the matter would be undertaken in secrecy as it is governed by the Official Secrets Act 1972,” Shafee said, before noting that Najib himself was clueless about CNA’s claims.
Shafee then provided a chronology of events on Najib’s bid to obtain a royal pardon over his conviction in relation to the misappropriation of RM42 million of 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) subsidiary SRC International Sdn Bhd’s funds.
Shafee said Najib’s petition for pardon was served on the Pardons Board via the Prime Minister’s Department’s Legal Affairs Division (BHEUU) director-general in Putrajaya on September 1, 2022.
Shafee said Najib’s lawyers later added more documents to the pardon application, in the form of an addendum on October 18, 2022 and an addendum on April 20, 2023, saying that both additions contain “further information” for the Yang di-Pertuan Agong’s consideration for the pardons petition.
“Until almost the end of 2023 we received no news or clue whatsoever about the petition for pardon,” he said.
Noting that Najib “was anxious on the status of his petition for pardon”, Shafee said the former prime minister had directed his lawyers to remind BHEUU on December 4, 2023 of his pending pardon petition “which has received no response thus far”.
Shafee said this was in light of the pardons petition having been filed more than 16 months ago and Najib having been in prison for a year and four months, by the time of December 4, 2023.
Shafee claimed Najib should not have been imprisoned, also alleging that his client did not get a fair trial in the SRC case.
“As lawyers, we are more anxious about our client’s position considering his sole ground for his request for pardon was on the basis that he had never received a fair trial, especially in the final leg of his appeal at the Federal Court. Our client therefore should not spend a day in prison,” Shafee claimed.
Citing the chronology of events for Najib’s bid to be pardoned of his SRC conviction and since his lawyers had on December 4, 2023 written to the BHEUU regarding the matter, Shafee said it would be “obvious” that both Najib and his lawyers were as late as last December “in the dark” about the status of his pardon bid.
Shafee expressed bafflement as to how CNA was able to provide a news report on Najib’s pardons bid’s status.
Shafee also highlighted that the power to pardon is an “unbridled, unfettered and absolute” prerogative power of the Yang di-Pertuan Agong, and that it would make it “disrespectful to second guess the activities of the Pardons Board” whose work must be done in “absolute secrecy for it to be effective in providing advice to the Yang di-Pertuan Agong”.
Shafee warned of the consequences of violating the OSA if the secrecy of the pardons process is breached.
“Breaches of this confidentiality and secrecy arguably can infringe the Official Secrets Act 1972 with the accompanying range of punishments prescribed therein,” he said.
Najib has been jailed since August 23, 2022, after the Federal Court upheld his conviction for criminal breach of trust, power abuse and money laundering in relation to SRC’s RM42 million.
The Federal Court in August 2022 maintained Najib’s 12-year jail sentence and RM210 million fine, and a separate five-judge panel at the Federal Court had on March 31, 2023 dismissed Najib’s bid to review the 2022 ruling which found him guilty and resulted in him serving his jail term.
To know how the royal pardon process works in Malaysia, click here for a summary by Malay Mail.
