PUTRAJAYA (Oct 14): Datin Seri Rosmah Mansor on Thursday (Oct 13) said that High Court judge Mohamed Zaini Mazlan had wrongly decided to call her to enter her defence, when the prosecution had purportedly failed to prove that she solicited money from Jepak Holdings Sdn Bhd for the RM1.25 billion solar hybrid project involving 369 schools in Sarawak.
These were among 127 grounds stated in her petition of appeal that was filed by her solicitor Messrs Akberdin & Co in the Court of Appeal on Thursday.
The main focus of the grounds was that Rosmah had not solicited for the bribe, as this was done by her former aide Datuk Rizal Mansor, and was offered by former Jepak Holdings managing director Saidi Abang Samsudin and his former business partner Rayyan Radzwill Abdullah.
With this, Rosmah's lawyers claimed that the High Court had erred in deciding to call her to enter her defence, when there was no solicitation by her, as it was done by Rizal, the petition stated.
The petition stated that the judge had failed to appreciate the element under Section 16 (a) A of the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission Act 2009, in deciding to call for her defence in the first place.
“The offer came from Saidi and Rayyan to help Rosmah’s husband and former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak in the 14th general election, and this was reflected in the opening statement of her case,” the petition stated.
Rizal, the court document said, was the actual "mastermind" and benefited from the solicitation, and the crown witness himself had admitted that he received part of the bribe money.
Furthermore, the High Court judge allegedly fell into error, when it was shown that Jepak Holdings obtained the project via letters and correspondence that it sent through Pekan Umno division secretary Datuk Ahmad Aazmey Abu Talib, where 11 of the notes minuted by Najib were from Aazmey, who forwarded the letters to the then PM.
“This shows that Rosmah was not the ‘prime mover’ of the project,” the court document said.
Rosmah was found guilty on three counts of graft with regard to the solar hybrid project involving 369 schools in rural Sarawak that was awarded to Jepak Holdings.
She was convicted of soliciting RM187.5 million of the RM1.25 billion project from Saidi, between January and April 2016, through Rizal.
On the second and third charges, she was convicted of receiving RM5 million and another RM1.5 million from Saidi at her private residence in Jalan Langgak Duta and then Najib’s official residence in Seri Perdana between Dec 20, 2016 and Sept 7, 2017.
Following her conviction, Zaini sentenced her to 10 years' jail and fined her RM970 million, which her lawyers claimed as unprecedented.
'Bag not handed directly to Rosmah'
With regard to Rosmah's conviction for receiving the bribe, her lawyers argued that there was no evidence the purported knapsacks containing RM1.5 million cash were handed to her directly, nor was there any testimony from either Saidi or Rayyan that the money was shown or counted before her.
“Rayyan himself testified that he did not see the money being handed to her, nor did he know what was in the knapsacks, when he accompanied Saidi to Rosmah’s private residence in Jalan Langgak Duta,” the document stated.
Rosmah's lawyers further pointed out that there were inconsistencies in Saidi’s testimony and, as a result, the defence had tried to impeach him, but this was dismissed by Zaini. The dismissal of the impeachment application amounted to an error in law on the part of the judge, the lawyers claimed.
The prosecution’s failure to call the butler at Rosmah's private home to testify the presence of such two knapsacks had created a material gap in the prosecution’s case, and this was not considered by the judge, the lawyers added.
They alleged that Rizal, who was initially charged with graft before becoming the crown witness and was freed of any offence, was not a credible witness in testifying that the knapsacks were picked by the butler.
The defence further highlighted the deficiency in not calling the two police officers who purportedly accompanied Saidi and his friend to bring the luggage bags containing RM5 million to Seri Perdana, which according to the lawyers also created gaps and doubt in the prosecution’s case.
Grounds for recusal
The lawyers for Rosmah also filed a separate petition of appeal citing that Zaini was wrong in not recusing himself from presiding over the case.
Prior to delivering his verdict, the defence made an application to recuse him, following an apparent leak of the judgement online.
They said that Zaini’s admission of a draft opinion of the High Court’s research unit, which was leaked on the Malaysia Today website, was disturbing. They alleged a real danger of bias, when Zaini decided to continue presiding over the case, as the judge did not deny that the 71-page leaked judgement was an opinion prepared by the research unit.
Zaini, when dismissing the application, said he had not read the draft opinion, as he had done his own research.
Rosmah's lawyers, meanwhile, said while Zaini had denied giving instructions to draft the leaked judgement, it defied logic as to who in the research unit would have the audacity to prepare it and, as stated in the front page of the leaked document, the draft was prepared for the judge.
The defence had asked that Rosmah's appeal to recuse Zaini be heard first before the main appeal.
The Court of Appeal has fixed Nov 14 for case management.