KUALA LUMPUR (May 31): The High Court on Wednesday (May 31) fixed July 11 for the hearing of former prime minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin's application to strike out his graft and money laundering charges.
Judge Datuk Muhammad Jamil Hussin fixed the date following case management on Wednesday.
Initially, lead counsel Datuk Hisyam Teh Poh Teik, who appeared with Datuk K Kumaraendran and Amer Hamzah Arshad, applied for three days of hearing as it involves novel issues, namely the charges are defective and the charges stipulate no offence or particulars being discussed.
However, Jamil ruled that one day was sufficient, and following this he fixed July 11 for hearing.
Deputy public prosecutors Datuk Wan Shaharuddin Wan Laden, Ahmad Akram Gharib and Zander Lim appeared for the prosecution.
Muhyiddin, 76, was charged at the KL Sessions Court in March this year with four counts of abuse of power under Section 23 of the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) Act 2009.
He has been accused of receiving RM232.5 million in bribes from corporate entities and an individual between March 1, 2020 and Aug 20, 2021 in his capacity as prime minister and Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia (Bersatu) president.
The charges alleged that the bribes were from Bukhary Equity Sdn Bhd, Nepturis Sdn Bhd, Mamfor Sdn Bhd and Datuk Azman Yusoff, and were deposited into Bersatu’s bank accounts
Muhyiddin is also facing three money laundering charges for receiving proceeds from illegal activities amounting to RM200 million from Bukhary Equity, out of the RM232.5 million.
Muhyiddin maintained that he was innocent, and the charges were a form of political persecution against him.
In seeking to strike out the abuse of power charges, he said the charges were defective and bad in law under Section 152 of the Criminal Procedure Code.
He contended that Bersatu is a society registered under Section 7(1) of the Societies Act 196, and that the MACC had confused the definition of organisation and equated it to a society, which are two distinct definitions.
Muhyiddin further alleged that neither one of the four abuse of power charges disclosed an offence under Section 23(1) of the MACC Act as Bersatu, being a society, cannot be construed as an associate, as the word “associate” is defined by Section 3 of the MACC Act to mean, among others, “any organisation of which such person, or any nominee of his, is a partner, or a person in charge or in control of, or has a controlling interest in, its business or affairs".
He further claimed that the charges are an abuse of process and in breach of Section 154 of the Criminal Procedure Code, as it allegedly lacked particulars as to how he had abused his position or the PM’s office for the purpose of gratification.
Thus, the former PM and Pagoh Member of Parliament claimed that his constitutional rights as enshrined under Article 5 of the Federal Constitution regarding liberty of a person, was violated as the failure to particularise how he had allegedly committed these abuses of power resulted in him being unable to give meaningful instructions to his lawyers to prepare his defence or representation.
Now his lawyers are going to three other High Courts to possibly fix dates in his application to transfer the cases to the High Court from the Sessions Court.