KUALA LUMPUR, March 12 — Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim lost his legal bid to scrub a second sodomy conviction from his records.

High Court judge Datuk Nik Hasmat Nik Mohamad dismissed the PKR leader’s legal challenge against the 2015 conviction and sentence, calling it a "backdoor attempt” to secure his release from prison.

"To me, this is a backdoor attempt. Sorry I have to say it. If it’s not backdoor attempt, it is a veiled attempt,” she said, adding that the Federal Court had previously affirmed the conviction in February 2015 and sentenced him to five years imprisonment.

Anwar was also ordered to pay RM5,000 in cost.

Nik Hasmat also ruled that Anwar had failed to name the person he accused of obtaining an allegedly fraud conviction against him.

"There is a need to name the particular officer under the Government Proceedings Act under his statement of claim, so that the government can answer to the fraud allegation.”

Nik Hasmat added that the fraud allegation was only brought up "a few years later”, after Anwar had been convicted.

On February 8, Anwar argued that that the conviction against him was affirmed by way of fraud.

However, senior federal counsel Awang Armadajaya Awang Mahmud counter argued, saying that Section 44 of the Evidence Act required the allegation of fraud to be established, and the fraud must refer to actual fraud, not constructive fraud, and that Anwar must name who he accused of fraud.

Awang added that the law required that the particulars of the fraud be exactly given and must be shown with sufficient details on how, when, where and in what way the alleged fraud was committed.

The plaintiff, he said, should have named the Attorney-General (AG), who is also the public prosecutor, and other officers who were alleged to have conducted the trial tainted with fraud, in order to establish a cause of action under Section 44 of the Evidence Act.

Anwar filed a legal challenge against his second conviction for sodomy in April last year, claiming the government had used "perjured” evidence in their case, demanding that he be freed from prison.

In his submission, Anwar had only named the government as the defendant.

Anwar, a former deputy prime minister-turned-Opposition leader was charged with sodomising his then-aide Mohd Saiful in 2008.

He was initially acquitted after a long trial in 2012, but the government appealed and he was later convicted and sentenced in February 2015.

Last year, Anwar’s lawyers N. Surendran and Latheefa Koya formally sent the Malaysian government a request to release Anwar from prison early, arguing that he had served more than half his prison term and that he is also the lynchpin for the Pakatan Harapan Opposition pact.

The application was made under the provisions of Section 43 of the Prisons Act 1995, which gives the Commissioner General power to "release upon licence any person serving a sentence of imprisonment”.

Surendran later told reporters after the High Court decision today that he would be challenging Nik Hasmat’s ruling in the Court of Appeal.