Group wants second legal body

The Star
BY MAZWIN NIK ANIS

PETALING JAYA: Disappointed with the Bar Council for its criticism against the judiciary, legal volunteer group SukaGuam wants to hold roadshows to gather feedback from the legal fraternity on the prospect of forming another legal body.

SukaGuam chairman Datuk Khairul Anwar Rahmat said having a second body would give lawyers the freedom of choosing the entity which they want to belong to instead of forcing theminto a situation where they are implicated along with the negative actions of the Bar Council.

“We will meet not only practising lawyers but also law graduates to get their views on the possibility of setting up another body for the legal fraternity,” he said.

On Saturday, some 100 members said they would seek the resignation and ask that the Attorney-General initiate contempt proceeding against Bar Council president Christopher Leong if he does not retract his statement on the Federal Court’s decision to uphold Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim’s sodomy conviction.

Senior lawyer Tan Sri Abdul Aziz Abdul Rahman who spoke on behalf of the lawyers said they were concerned that the Bar president made such remarks about the judicial system and the courts “in the name of representing the Malaysian Bar”.

Leong, in response to the group’s demand, had welcomed their views and encouraged them to attend the Malaysian Bar annual general meeting on March 14 to raise the matter. The Bar Council has almost 16,000 members.

Yesterday, the 100 practising lawyers, known as G100 said they were not associated with SukaGuam and had not mandated anyone or group other than its official spokesman to issue statements on their behalf.

“As much as G100 as a group of concerned, independent, individual members of the Bar is calling for fellow members to support of the petition regardless of their political leanings or beliefs, this effort and exercise is not headed or arranged by any organisation, political or otherwise,” the group said in a statement.