Din Merican
My wife, Dr. Kamsiah and I were at the Courts today to listen to the tail end of prosecution’s submission and Dato Shafee Abdullah ‘s brilliant rebuttal. In not more than 25 minutes, the respected lawyer convinced the Honorable Judge Somathy that his client, Dato Ramli Yusuff, should be acquitted with his defense being called as the prosecution could not establish a prima facie case, despite the best efforts of the DPP. That precisely what the Judge did.
Finally, and to the relief of family, friends and associates, Dato Ramli is spared further humiliation and agony from the MACC working in concert with the IGP and the AG. Earlier, this cabal had pursued him in Kota Kinabalu and Kuala Lumpur. In both cases, the MACC lost.
It is indeed a good day for Dato Ramli and his friends and supporters. But upon reflection, I am saddened by the fact the MACC had incurred a lot of taxpayers’ money by charging Datuk Ramli for the third time , failing again for the third time and the Court was asked to hear a case for which there is no basis to charge him in the first place. Even more painful is the fact in order to uphold his honour and dignity , Dato Ramli had to incur legal expenses to defend himself.
Without sounding like a soothsayer, I knew at the start of this case that there was no basis to charge Dato Ramli. Most of us who attended the trial knew that he had the permission of his boss, the then IGP Tan Sri Bakri Omar to establish a company Kinsajaya Sdn. Berhad but he was not a director on May 2, 2006 as claimed by the persecution. As for his involvement in business while being a public servant, the prosecution could not establish that Dato Ramli was engaged in trading, even if it could show that he was director on the aforementioned date (which the prosecution did not, since his two sisters were still directors of the company and had signed the financial statement for the year ending June 30, 2006). By the way, Kinsajaya is a dormant company.
The MACC has again discredited itself in the eyes of the Malaysian public. It showed itself to be an instrument of selective prosecution. It is not interested in fighting corruption but it is part of a conspiracy, in this case to “finish off” a public official who had the conviction and courage to investigate people in the corridors of power. Having failed three times to obtain a conviction against Dato Ramli, the MACC is well advised to drop the case against Lawyer Rosli Dahlan because they will again not be able to establish prima facie case. I have written quite extensively on the Rosli Dahlan case and the antics of a certain Kevin Morais and the DPP who is pursuing the case. Stop the fabrications and lies and get on with the real business of fighting corruption. Take justice seriously.–Din Merican
by Joseph Sipalan@www.malaysiakini.com
Former commercial crime chief Dato Ramli Yusuff can finally heave a sigh of relief as the Sessions court today dismissed the third and final criminal charge against him.
Judge SM Komathy Suppiah ruled that the prosecution had failed to prove a prima facie case against the ex-top cop on the charge of breaching laws preventing civil servants from being involved in private business.
She said that the evidence presented by the prosecution could not prove that Ramli (right) had in fact taken on the role of director at Kinsajaya Sdn Bhd on May 2, 2006, which she said is the “essential ingredient” of the charge.
She argued further that even if that point could be proven, the prosecution again failed to show that Ramli was engaged in any form of trading while in his alleged capacity as a director of the said company.
The prosecution’s submission that Ramli had indeed engaged in trading by virtue of becoming the company’s director rang hollow as the definition of trade must consider that it involves at least two parties in a bilateral exchange and is “habitual or a regular cause of conduct”, she said.
“The evidence shows that the defendant was a director of a dormant company… the company had no business, had no partners, so it cannot be said that the defendant had engaged in trade,” Komathy said when delivering her judgment.
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