TOMMY Thomas broke his silence over the US$14.9 billion (RM66.4 billion) Sulu award today, calling it “fraudulent and dishonest” and said the current Attorney-General should contest the claims. 

The former AG during the second Mahathir government said it was unnecessary to form a task force to look into the issue. 

“Because this is pre-eminently a legal dispute, the Attorney General, as the chief legal adviser for the nation, should be left to defend Malaysia’s interests. It is currently in safe hands.  

“There is no need for a special task force or any other committee to be set up.  Further, the dispute has reached an advanced stage in July 2022, as I write this,” Thomas said in a statement released today. 

He said that a committee is a bureaucratic excuse for indecision and the government should let the Attorney General decide whether to consult anybody. 

Thomas also said the arbitrator Dr Gonzalo Stampa had perversely re-wrote the terms of the 1878 Grant. 

“No legal system, domestic or international, permits such a radical transformation by a third party of the bargain originally reached by the parties.  Stampa’s award is “per-incuriam”, hence, it is void and unenforceable.  

“Stampa’s relocation of the seat of arbitration to France because the courts of Spain had ordered him to cease the arbitration makes it a fraudulent and dishonest award,” the veteran lawyer said.

Thomas also said Stampa had disregarded the 2020 decision of the High Court of Sabah that it is the forum for resolving disputes arising from the 1878 Grant.

“The decision of any other forum purporting to exercise jurisdiction over this matter is illegitimate and ought to be completely disregarded by the Malaysian government,” he said.

Thomas said the formation of Malaysia in 1963 presented a natural opportunity to end the annual payments to the Sulu claimants.

“Our founding fathers could have easily argued that the 1878 Grant was a colonial relic which did not bind the new federation and the annual obligation to pay compensation shall remain with the British.”

“Regrettably, the new federation instead assumed the legal obligation of the retreating British colonial power to pay annual compensation without hesitation or protest.”

He pointed out that Malaysia made such payments annually and without interruption until 2013.

The continuous payment by Malaysia for 50 years, he said, is “strong indeed indisputable evidence” that Malaysia stepped into the shoes of the British Government as successor-in-title, and is stopped from contending otherwise.

In the middle of this month, heirs of a late Sulu sultan seized two Luxembourg subsidiaries of Petronas

The Luxembourg-registered subsidiaries, Petronas Azerbaijan (Shah Deniz) and Petronas South Caucasus, managed the national petroleum company’s gas interests in Azerbaijan and could be worth, according to news reports, more than US$2 billion.

The move is part of legal efforts launched in 2017 by the Sulu heirs over compensation to “territories and lands” in 1878 under the so-called the 1878 Grant. – July 27, 2022.