CONVICTED former prime minister Najib Razak’s defence team has submitted a request to the appeals court to postpone the hearing for the SRC International case after one of his lawyers tested positive for Covid-19.

The prosecution confirmed this morning that lead defence counsel Muhammad Shafee Abdullah wrote to the court with its request last night.

In his letter to the court registrar, Shafee said his son and colleague Muhammad Farhan tested positive for Covid-19 yesterday.

Shafee also stated that Najib was a close contact for being present at the firm yesterday.

The court had scheduled Najib’s application to present new evidence in the appeal for today.

The panel had been set to rule on Wednesday whether to uphold or overturn Najib’s conviction for multiple counts of money laundering, criminal breach of trust and abuse of power.

Previously, Najib had applied for the court to delay the date because he would be in quarantine after returning from Singapore on December 5. The court rejected his application.

Meanwhile, the prosecution also told reporters there was no response from the court to Shafee’s request and the hearing is to go ahead as scheduled this morning.

On July 28, 2020, High Court judge Mohd Nazlan Mohd Ghazali sentenced Najib to 10 years in prison for each of the three criminal breach of trust (CBT) charges and three money laundering cases, as well as 12 years in prison and a fine of RM210 million for one charge of abuse of power.

All charges relate to Najib’s part in the misappropriation of RM42 million in SRC International funds during his time in office, with Nazlan ruling that the sentences run concurrently.

He later allowed Najib’s application to stay the execution of the decision pending the disposal of his appeal, with a bail of RM2 million in two sureties. – December 7, 2021.