THE Federal Court has fixed April 6 for another case management of UK-based King’s Counsel Jonathan Laidlaw’s appeal to be admitted as an advocate and solicitor to represent Najib Razak in his SRC International Sdn Bhd (SRC) criminal case.

Deputy public prosecutor Mohd Ashrof Adrin Kamarul and lawyer for the Malaysian Bar, Annemarie Pravina Vendargon confirmed this when contacted.

Annemarie said the date for the case management was fixed pending the decision of Najib’s review, due to be delivered on March 31. 

She said the hearing date will be fixed during the next case management.

Lawyer Wan Muhammad Arfan Wan Othman, representing Laidlaw, and federal counsel Noor Atiqah Zainal Abidin, appearing on behalf of the Attorney-General’s Chambers (AGC), were present during case management proceedings today.

Lawyer Lim Sze Han represented the KL Bar Committee.

The Federal Court was supposed to hear Laidlaw’s appeal, as well as the applications by the public prosecutor and three others to strike out Laidlaw’s appeal and the public prosecutor’s application to intervene in Laidlaw’s appeal on March 15. 

However,  the hearing was postponed and a case management was fixed for today. Today’s case management was held before Federal Court deputy registrar Suhaila Haron.

Laidlaw had filed an appeal to the Federal Court after the High Court rejected his application to be admitted as an advocate and solicitor on July 21 last year.

The public prosecutor, who was not named as a respondent in Laidlaw’s appeal, subsequently filed an intervener application to be included as the fourth respondent in the latter’s appeal on grounds it was a party in the proceedings at the High Court, but was unilaterally dropped in the appeal.

In a notice of motion, filed on November 18 last year, the public prosecutor also sought to strike out Laidlaw’s appeal on grounds the appeal is academic, an abuse of process and unsustainable.

Meanwhile, the AGC, the Malaysian Bar and Kuala Lumpur Bar Committee, named as respondents in Laidlaw’s appeal, have also filed their respective applications to strike out Laidlaw’s appeal.

Najib, 69, is serving a 12-year jail sentence after the Federal Court, on August 23, upheld his conviction, jail sentence and RM210 million fine for misappropriation of RM42 million SRC International funds.

The Federal Court has set March 31 to rule on the former prime minister’s review bid. – Bernama, March 22, 2023.