The Federal Court said there was no need for Chief Justice Tengku Maimun Tuan Mat to recuse herself from presiding over Najib Razak’s final SRC International appeal hearing.
PUTRAJAYA: .The five-member bench led by Tengku Maimun said the defence failed to provide reasonable grounds to recuse her from the bench. The other judges on the panel are Chief Judge of Sabah and Sarawak Abang Iskandar Abang Hashim and Federal Court judges Nallini Pathmanathan, Mary Lim and Zabidin Mohamad Diah.
In her ruling, Tengku Maimun said her husband’s Facebook post four years ago had no nexus to the SRC case.“This case had yet to exist,” she said, pointing out that Najib was only charged in July that year. Meanwhile, on the defence’s contention that she issued a letter and “sanctioned” lawyers to adjourn their cases and join the Walk for Justice in June, Tengku Maimun said the letter was “a non-starter”. She said the letter was “standard” and did not disclose any real danger of bias.