Restraining order served on speaker

By Andrew Ong (Malaysiakini)
Perak legislative assembly speaker V Sivakumar was today served with a court order restraining him from holding any unlawful assembly meetings.

However the order could not be served on Sivakumar personally as he was not in his office at the state secretariat.

As such lawyers for Menteri Besar Zambry Abdul Kadir and his six exco members served the order on state legal advisor Ahmad Kamal Shahid at 3.15pm.

"We tried to serve documents today but as you can see the office is closed. We'll try again soon," said Lawyer Faizul Hilmy Ahmad Zamri.

Faizul then returned to the state secretariat at 4.15pm again to serve the notice personally on Sivakumar.

However, once again the speaker was not at his office and as such the notice was served on his staff who received the order.

Can court order be retrospective?

When asked if the court order can be applied retrospectively, Faizul (right in photo) said, "The judge did not say this. This is your own assumption".

The order, which was obtained yesterday afternoon following an application by Zambry and his exco members, barred Sivakumar from convening any unlawful meetings purporting to be state assemblies.

However, it is unclear if the order has any effect on yesterday's meeting which was held outside the assembly building at a car park.

The order was issued by Ipoh High Court judicial commissioner Ridwan Ibrahim.

The order in full reads:

"It is hereby ordered that the 1st defendant, YB Encik V Sivakumar is restraint from convening any unlawful meetings purporting it to be a meeting of the Perak state legislative assembly." [Click here to see the order]

The judge had also ruled yesterday that Sivakumar could not be represented by any private lawyers and can only be represented by the state legal advisor as the "speaker was part of the government".

Lawyer: 'Under tree' assembly not affected

However, Sivakumar's lawyer Chan Kok Keong has described the restraining order as “harmless”.

“Mr Speaker has not convened any unlawful meeting nor will he do so,” said Chan when met at his office today, soon after he received the order.

Chan (far left in photo) added that the order was “vague” and does not appear to have achieved any purpose.

"It does not seem to achieve anything. It said that speaker should not convene any unlawful assembly. As far as speaker is concerned, everything he does is in accordance with the law," he added.

As such, Chan said that Sivakumar’s legal team has no plans to set aside the court order at this point.

On the emergency assembly sitting held yesterday, Chan said that the court order has no bearing on the sitting.

“There was absolutely no pronouncement by the court affecting the morning proceedings,” he said.

Speaker not properly represented at hearing

Meanwhile, Chan said that the court order indicated that Sivakumar was not properly represented when the order was issued.

According to the court order, judicial commissioner Ridwan heard submissions from senior federal counsel Zulqarnain “on behalf of the state legal advisor”.

“Having excluded us, it does not appear from the face of the order that he acted for the speaker, contrary to the impression given to us that he would act for Mr Speaker.

“There is no such thing as Zulqarnain Hassan appearing on behalf of the state legal advisor, because the state legal advisor is not a party to the proceedings,” he said.

However, according to the court order, Chan said that it was explicitly stated that Sivakumar, in his capacity as state speaker and the legislative assembly, was a party to the court order.

Chan and his team of lawyers were forced to withdraw as Sivakumar’s lawyers during proceedings in chambers yesterday because the judge had ruled that only the state legal advisor could represent the speaker.

In respond, Chan had argued that the decision was erroneous based on Article 132 (3)(b) of the Federal Constitution which states that the speaker of the Parliament or a state assembly are not civil servants.

Although it was previously learnt that Sivakumar will be appealing against the order stopping private lawyers from appearing from him tomorrow, it is since been confirmed that such an appeal will not be lodged in Putrajaya tomorrow.