THE trial of Najib Razak was procedurally and legally correct, lead prosecutor V. Sithambaram told the Court of Appeal today, in the case of funds stolen from SRC international Bhd.

Sithambaram emphasised that the defendant had received a fair chance to present his case.

Najib is appealing his conviction and sentence for corruption charges involving RM42 million of SRC International’s money.

The former prime minister was found guilty on all seven charges of criminal breach of trust, money laundering and abuse of power by High Court judge Mohd Nazlan Mohd Ghazali on July 28 last year.

During the trial, Najib’s lawyer had complained that the prosecution kept “moving the goalposts”.

He said the prosecution’s questions were not relevant during cross-examination of the defence witnesses, and accused the prosecution of trying to establish a whole new case unrelated to the charges. 

Sithambaram rebutted this today during submissions in Najib’s appeal hearing.

He said the defence had tried to prevent new, damaging evidence that had surfaced during questioning of the witnesses from being admitted by the court.

“Hence this ingenious attempt to exclude the relevant and admissible evidence in this appeal,” Sithambaram said.

“In short, all damaging evidence against the appellant (Najib) elicited in the cross-examination of the appellant must be excluded as they are inadmissible,” he said.

The evidence that the defence sought to be excluded showed Najib had knowledge of his bank account and balance, and had treated SRC funds as his own, he said.

“During prosecution, the defence said Jho Low had manipulated Najib’s account without his knowledge.

“But during the defence, Najib said he had tasked Jho Low to ensure that there were sufficient funds in Najib’s accounts to issue his numerous cheques.

“The defence submission is a desperate one that has no legal basis,” said the prosecutor.

Sithambaram also said the prosecution had never diverted from its case.

“The defence’s evidence, if anything, was complementary to the prosecution’s case.“

A large part of the defence’s submission for the appeal has been centred on judge Nazlan’s inexperience.

Sithambaram said it was “unwarranted” for the defence to call the judge “biased”, “hopelessly incompetent” and “prejudiced”.

“The submission of the defence, both in and out of the court, is that the trial judge was biased in handling this case, which meant that the judge was in favour of the prosecution’s. This is a serious allegation.

“This submission is to save the integrity of this ground of judgment… to ensure that the due administration of justice is not in any way tainted,” Sithambaram said.

Sithambaram said that Najib was also given the opportunity to put up his defence by calling 19 witnesses over a span of 31 days.

Najib is out on bail for RM2 million.

Today is the 12th day of the appeal hearing, which continues before a three-man bench led by Abdul Karim Abdul Jalil, sitting with Vazeer Alam Mydin Meera and Has Zanah Mehat. – April 22, 2021.