Neuter and nullify – not nurture – Najib’s noxious narrative

by M Santhananaban

The dismissal of the final appeal by former Prime Minister Najib Razak by four of the five judges of a Federal Court panel should have brought finality and closure to the case.

Instead, from 31 March, when that decision was delivered, an attempt is being made to turn Najib’s convictions into a sort of a national nightmare.

The honourable High Court judge who had first heard and decided the SRC International case, Nazlan Ghazali, is being attacked in an irresponsible and intimidating way for allegedly breaching some imprecise ethics of judges.

This Judges’ Code of Ethics was gazetted on 24 June 2009, within three months of Najib becoming the prime minister.

When one reads the code of ethics, it will be noted that it was thought that the chief justice adjudicating on the code would be a man. The gazette notification bears the signature of a former chief secretary who voluntarily drew RM30,000 monthly for reportedly not doing anything in 1MDB.

Of course, these observations do not render the Judges’ Code of Ethics moot.

In respect of Najib’s SRC International case, it is clear the chief justice had not found Justice Nazlan guilty of any breach. The matter should end there.

Instead, there has been a move to invalidate Justice Nazlan’s original judgment in the SRC International case

That judgment has passed muster with 12 other judges.

One Federal Court judge’s dissenting decision and a report from the mediocre MACC, which has spawned by design or default a culture of uncontrolled corruption, cannot invalidate Justice Nazlan’s findings.

Pardon pleas

Barely 10 days after that decision to dismiss Najib’s appeal, the erstwhile grand old party of Onn Jaafar and Tunku Abdul Rahman seems to have decided on pursuing an appeal for pardon to the Agong.

It is a political party clinging on to power by hanging on to the coat-tails of Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim.

Umno is badly mutilated because for forty years it had allowed Dr Mahathir Mohamad and Mammon to sermonise and strategise it to such narrow ends that its notional rival has become its national rival. Pas is now sending shivers down the spine of the new crop of Umno leaders.

One way of looking at this premature appeal plea may be through the perspective of a derailed and disillusioned political party.

It would be out of character and adventurous for the current prime minister to assist or facilitate the processing of an appeal. However, he can be part of the process in a sort of a detached way. He cannot allow his own prison experience to cloud this issue. He has to remember there was no black eye for this much-favoured blue-eyed white-collar criminal.

Some years must pass before any prime minister can be proactive in this process.

Perhaps we should make a small concession to an out-of-gas Umno and not make those moves for a pardon loom so large. Nothing should come of it, not in the immediate or foreseeable future.

But that nasty, negative and noxious campaign against the judiciary must stop or be stopped. The judiciary must continue to be allowed to perform its allotted role in an independent and unimpeded manner.

Dato M Santhananaban is a retired ambassador with 45 years of public sector experience

The views expressed in Aliran's media statements and the NGO statements we have endorsed reflect Aliran's official stand. Views and opinions expressed in other pieces published here do not necessarily reflect Aliran's official position.

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