Najib’s appeal against SRC conviction moved to April

KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 3 — Former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s hearing for his appeal against his conviction in the case involving the SRC International Sdn Bhd’s RM42 million funds will now start in April, instead of the previously scheduled dates in February and March.

Muhammad Farhan Muhammad Shafee, who is one of Najib’s lawyers, confirmed that the new hearing dates for the appeal before the Court of Appeal are April 5 to 8, April 12 to 15, April 19 to 22.

The new hearing dates for Najib’s appeal against his conviction and sentence in the SRC case were fixed in a case management today.

These new hearing dates replace the previous dates — February 15 to 18, February 22 to 25, and March 1 to 4 — that were scheduled in October 2020 for Najib’s SRC appeal.

Malay Mail understands from Najib’s defence team that the rescheduling of Najib’s SRC appeal hearing from February and March to the new dates in April is due to the need to check and sort the records of appeal, and with the movement control order (MCO) also being a factor.

The MCO was reintroduced since January 13 in parts of Malaysia including Putrajaya, Kuala Lumpur and Selangor, and now covers all of Malaysia except Sarawak. On February 2, the government announced that the MCO will be extended to February 18.

On July 28, 2020, the High Court convicted Najib over all the seven charges — covering the offences of criminal breach of trust, power abuse, money laundering — in relation to SRC International’s RM42 million.

The High Court sentenced Najib to a 12-year prison term and a fine of RM210 million with an additional five years if the fine is not paid for the power abuse charge, as well as jail terms of 10 years each for each of the six other charges.

The High Court had ruled that the prison terms are to be served concurrently or would run at the same time, which means the maximum jail term that would have to be served by Najib is 12 years.

Najib had however obtained a stay of execution of his sentence while he pursues his appeal at the Court of Appeal, and had paid an additional RM1 million bail as part of the condition to stay the sentence.

Najib had on July 30, 2020 filed at the Court of Appeal for an appeal against the SRC conviction and sentencing.