Ex-CJ denies interfering in apex court judges' decisions

Free Malaysia Today

5 days ago

Tengku Maimun Tuan Mat stepped down as chief justice on July 1, and Abdul Rahman Sebli retired as the chief judge of Sabah and Sarawak on July 24.
PUTRAJAYA : Tengku Maimun Tuan Mat has denied allegations that she had attempted to sway the opinions of Federal Court judges during her tenure as chief justice, particularly in matters of constitutional interpretation.
Tengku Maimun, who served as the top judge from May 2019 to July 1 this year, said the Federal Court had decided 19 constitution-related cases during that time and she was in the minority on five occasions.
'Statistically, five out of 19 represent about 25% of the dissenting judgments.
'That fact alone would manifest that judges decided independently without fear of favour, without external and internal pressure,' she told reporters after attending the elevation ceremony for 20 Court of Appeal and High Court judges here today.
She said if she had truly wielded influence over the apex court's decisions, she would not have found herself in the minority or issued dissenting opinions on so many occasions.
She was responding to claims by Abdul Rahman Sebli, who retired as chief judge of Sabah and Sarawak on Thursday, that he once came under pressure from a 'very senior member of the judiciary' to rule in favour of a litigant who had sued the federal government in a controversial constitutional case.
Rahman dropped the bombshell during a farewell speech to judges, lawyers, judicial officers and legal officials in Kuching on Wednesday.
He said that as a Federal Court judge at the time, he had prepared a draft judgment which he circulated to six other members of the bench for their review.
'Not long after that, I received an email from a very senior member of the judiciary telling me how wrong my opinion was on the constitutional issue.
'I was a relatively junior (judge) compared to the judges who pressured me,' Rahman said, adding that he was essentially asked to toe the line.
Rahman said he stood by his draft judgment in the case, which held that the constitutional issue should be decided in favour of the federal government and not the litigant.
His opinion was supported by three other panel members, making it a narrow 4-3 majority decision. He said among those in the majority was the then-president of the Court of Appeal.
Tengku Maimun was in the minority.
However, the majority decision was later set aside in what he described as an unusual move by a three-member Federal Court panel less than a year later.
Rahman was referring to the final appeal by Maria Chin Abdullah, who was barred from travelling overseas in May 2016 without any reasons provided by the immigration department.
In her minority ruling, Tengku Maimun declared that the ban was unlawful. It had been imposed on Maria, who was the Bersih 2.0 chairman, on grounds that she had allegedly disparaged the government.
The majority of four judges, with Rahman writing the main judgment, had upheld the validity of an ouster clause in the Immigration Act, barring decisions from being challenged in court. Rahman held that judicial power was determined by Parliament.
In her minority ruling, Tengku Maimun declared the clause unconstitutional and said the right to travel fell within the scope of the constitutional guarantee on personal liberty.
She also stated that the Federal Constitution's clause on the powers of the judiciary should be read in the context of its original meaning, as it represented a basic feature of the constitution, regardless of later amendments.
Article 121(1) originally vested the judicial power of the federation in the courts.
An amendment in 1988 removed the words 'the judicial power of the federation' and merely stated that the courts would derive their powers from federal law.
Rahman, who also attended today's event, said he stood by what he had said in his speech last week.
'There is nothing to worry about as what I spoke was the truth,' he said.