malaysia
Shafee’s claim of selective prosecution unfounded, says Bar chief
The Malaysian Bar Council president Steven Thiru says it upholds high ethical standards in the legal profession which are applicable to all members without exception. – The Malaysian Insider file pic, March 10, 2016.The Malaysian Bar said that lawyer Tan Sri Muhammad Shafee's allegations that he was subject to selective prosecution for professional misconduct was baseless.
“The Bar upholds high ethical standards in the legal profession which are applicable to all members without exception,” its president Steven Thiru told The Malaysian Insider today.
Thiru was responding to Shafee's claim before the Federal Court yesterday after the senior lawyer was cleared for allegedly breaching the publicity rules following an interview with a daily in 2009.
Shafee had asked the court to award him RM300,000 in costs to “teach the Bar Council a lesson” in light of the “selective prosecution” against him.
Judge Tan Sri Raus Sharif, who led a five-man bench gave Shafee RM50,000 in costs.
However, Thiru said he was surprised by the exorbitant costs awarded by the court.
“As the Bar is discharging its statutory duties in disciplinary matters in the interest of the public , there should not have been any order of costs,” he added.
He said the Court of Appeal last year which reversed the decision of the High Court also did not order costs against the council in recognition of its public interest role in the matter.
Thiru said the Bar was disappointed with the decision of the apex court.
In dismissing the council's appeal, Raus said there was no violation if the interview is read in the context of the publicity rules.
In July last year, a three man bench chaired by Datuk Tengku Maimon Tuan Mat, allowed the lawyer's appeal and also ordered that the RM5,000 fine imposed by the Advocates and Solicitors Disciplinary Board be returned.
Maimon said that the statement made by Shafee in the context of the whole interview was not in breach of the rule.
Shafee had been interviewed by The Star newspaper in an article published on September 27, 2009, and the article was said to be “laudatory” of the Umno lawyer.
In 2010, then Bar Council chairman Ragunath Kesavan reported the matter to the (advocates and solicitors disciplinary) board following the article's publication.
The board fined Shafee on October 5, 2012 for the misconduct.
On January 10, 2014 High Court judge Datuk Zaleha Yusof said she found it unnecessary to “disturb” the findings of the board which concluded that Shafee was guilty of professional misconduct.
She said what mattered here was the opinion of the board as provided for by Rule 15(1)(b).
Senior lawyers Tommy Thomas and Tan Sri VC George had filed a resolution to discuss Shafee's conduct following Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim’s sodomy conviction by the Federal Court at the Malaysian Bar annual general meeting last year.
They had also wanted Shafee to appear before the board for alleged professional misconduct.
However, Shafee obtained an injunction to stop the AGM to discuss the matter.
Subsequently he filed a defamation suit against the Malaysian Bar and three others for attempting to discuss his conduct at AGM.
The matter is being heard by Kuala Lumpur High Court judge Datuk Hanipah Farikullah. – March 10, 2016.
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