THE SRC International hearing will continue online at 12.30pm or an arrest warrant will be issued against Najib Razak immediately, the Court of Appeal said today.

Court of Appeal judge Abdul Karim Abdul Jalil, who is leading a three-judge panel alongside Has Zanah Mehat and Vazeer Alam Mydin Meera, also said the decision on Najib’s appeal against his conviction will go on tomorrow.

Last night, Najib’s lead counsel Muhammad Shafee Abdullah submitted a request to postpone the hearing for the SRC International case after one of his lawyers tested positive for Covid-19.

“Najib has two choices. We can cancel the (RM2 million) bail, with the bail money considered confiscated.

“And upon the cancellation, we will immediately issue a warrant of arrest against Najib for him to be in court.

“The second choice is that we can proceed online under Section 15(a) of the Court of Judicature Act 1964.

“And this is the court’s order, we do not need the parties’ consent,” Karim said.

Ad hoc prosecutor V. Sithambaram had also requested that the court proceed online so as to not show favour to the defence and for the interest of justice.

Lawyer Harvinder Singh Sidhu represented the defence as lead counsel Muhammad Shafee Abdullah and the rest of the team were not present in court today.

Najib was absent as well with only his two bailors present. The bailors were given a stern lecture for being caught broadcasting the proceedings which is against the court’s rule.

“You yourself (bailor) do not know why Najib is not here. You are just guessing,” Karim said.

Harvinder had tried to ask the court to delay the hearing for a week, stating that the defence was not prepared.

“That is the objective, right? To proceed after December 8 (Najib’s appeal conviction decision),” Karim said.

“The one thing that we are not happy about is that the appellate is not interested in coming here. This is not a coffee shop, this is a court!”

Karim then raised his voice, saying “for the interest of whom exactly!”, in response to Harvinder’s explanation that the no-show by the defence team and Najib was in the interest of public health.

The judge also commented that the defence had tried all ways to postpone the hearing: “Now, they are using Covid-19 as an excuse!”

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

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

On July 28, 2020, High Court judge Mohd Nazlan Mohd Ghazali sentenced Najib to 10 years’ jail for each of the three criminal breach of trust 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.