Shafee unhappy over DPP’s appointment being classified as ‘official secret’

(The Star) – Former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak’s lead counsel Tan Sri Dr Muhammad Shafee Abdullah (took a swipe at the “Malaysia Baru” touted by the government, claiming a lack of transparency in the appointment of the Deputy Public Prosecutor (DPP).

Muhammad Shafee said to this date, the prosecution had not shown the appointment letter of its lead prosecutor Datuk Sulaiman Abdullah (pic), who replaced Attorney-General Tommy Thomas in the criminal case against Najib.

He slammed Sulaiman for answering that his appointment was stamped by the Attorney-General as an “official secret”, saying that the public has the right to know how he is appointed.

“When I was appointed as the DPP in Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim’s (sodomy appeal) case, Datuk Mohamad Hanafiah Zakaria, who was my assistant gave the fiat (authorisation) document to the court and a copy to the other side (defence) to say how I was appointed.

“You say the New Malaysia is supposed to be transparent. But according to him, the Attorney-General has chopped it as an official secret.

“Why is the appointment of a DPP an official secret when all the rest of the DPPs in the Attorney-General Chambers are gazetted for the whole world to know?” he questioned.

To add to the defence team’s annoyance, the prosecution had also tried to serve the documents under Section 51A of the Criminal Procedure Code, but in CD-ROM format and not in hard copy.

Muhammad Shafee said this wasted time as not only were one-third of the documents spoiled but were hard to follow as there was no indexing.

“We did not know if that CD is complete in its documentation. One-third of the documents could not be read.

“They were in between other documents and this disturbed the reading.

“There was also no indexing or content so the defence did not know head or tail,” Muhammad Shafee complained.

He met reporters outside the courthouse after Najib’s case mention before High Court Judge Mohd Nazlan Mohd Ghazali over the three counts of criminal breach of trust, one charge of abuse of power and three counts of money laundering involving SRC International Sdn Bhd funds totalling RM42mil.

“Why are you mistreating us and giving us a CD format when thousands, maybe millions of other accused persons are given hard copy documents?” said Muhammad Shafee.

Oct 31 has been set as the date for the court to argue case management of the documents and other matters including the discovery of the appointment letter.