High Court dismisses AGC's committal bid against Isham Jalil for contempt

The Star

The Kuala Lumpur High Court on Tuesday (July 8) dismissed committal proceedings brought by the Attorney General’s Chambers (AGC) against former Umno information chief Isham Jalil for public statements about Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) cases.   Read more at https://tinyurl.com/nc8f2jy4   WATCH MORE: https://thestartv.com/c/news SUBSCRIBE: https://cutt.ly/TheStar LIKE: https://fb.com/TheStarOnline

Transcript

00:00The Kuala Lumpur High Court on Tuesday dismissed the Attorney General's Chamber's

00:07contempt bid against former UMNO Information Chief Isham Jalil.

00:12Justice K. Munyandi ruled that Isham's public statements regarding

00:16Datuk Seri Najib Razak's 1MDB and SRC cases did not amount to contempt of court.

00:22Basically, what the Leonard Judge decided today is that in a matter of contempt like this,

00:31it must be proven that the comment made by Isham or by anybody for that matter

00:37runs the real risk of interfering with the administration of justice.

00:44And that, the Leonard Judge find that whatever was commented by N.J. Isham

00:48does not have a real risk of interfering with the administration of justice.

00:53Both cases that he commented on, 1MDB and SRC have gone on properly and it has been decided

00:59properly.

01:02And the Leonard Judge is also opinion that

01:04the best way for judges for the court to answer criticism

01:11is to come up with a very good and detailed judgment

01:15so that people understand what they are doing

01:19and why they are doing the ground of their decision

01:23so that all the attacks against the judiciary

01:30could be avoided just by reading the judgment.

01:35So, the Leonard Judge took a very modern approach

01:39in saying that the freedom of speech

01:43to comment on matters in court

01:46must be also balanced

01:48against the interference of justice.

01:52But in this case,

01:54his lordship, he saw the opinion

01:56that the comment made by N.J. Isham

01:58does not cross that line.

02:00So, he did not find it contemptuous.

02:03The AGC filed the contempt application

02:06on December 28, 2023

02:09following Isham's remarks

02:11in an interview titled

02:13Town Hall for Justice

02:15Keadilan Sebenarnya Untuk Siapa

02:18In his remarks,

02:20Isham had criticised the corruption trial

02:22and appeal involving his former boss

02:24Datuk Seri Najib Razak

02:26in relation to the One Malaysia Development Berhad

02:29and SRC International Sendirian Berhad cases.

02:32The recorded interview

02:34which discussed the trial

02:35and appeal proceedings

02:36in the SRC and 1MDB cases

02:39was posted on the Facebook page

02:41of the Malaya Post

02:43on September 30, 2023.

Category

Transcript

Recommended