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©The
Sun (Used by permission)
by Llew-Ann Phang
KUALA LUMPUR (Jan 14, 2008): The Royal Commission of
Inquiry on the Lingam Video Clip kicked off its proceedings today with an
unprecedented - though not unexpected - move by a lawyer for three witnesses to
ask three of the five panel members to discharge themselves on several grounds.
However, the three commissioners decided later to remain on the bench, saying
they saw no reason to recuse themselves at this juncture.
The other two members of the commission are retired Court of Appeal judge Datuk
Mahadev Shankar and Suhakam commissioner Professor Emeritus Datuk Dr Khoo Kay
Kim.
When the inquiry started at 10am in a packed courtroom at the Jalan Duta Court
Complex, M. Puravelan made an application on behalf of Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim,
his aide Sim Tze Tsin and R. Sivarasa for commission chairman Tan Sri Haidar
Mohd Noor, members Tan Sri Steve Shim and Puan Sri Zaitun Zawiyah to be
discharged.
His grounds for doing so:
On Haidar:
• The former chief judge of Malaya sits on the Perdana Foundation board of
trustees, a body that is related to former premier Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad who
is a witness in the proceedings.
• He was one of the Court of Appeal judges who presided in
the Raphael Pura case where the parties sought to submit as evidence a
photograph of Datuk V.K.Lingam holidaying with former chief justice Tun Eusoff
Chin.
On Shim:
• His name was mentioned in the video clip and this could affect proceedings
should he be called in as a witness.
On Zaitun:
• The former solicitor-general had dealt with civil corruption cases involving
Anwar (who exposed the video clip)
Robert Lazar who represents the Bar Council in the proceedings supported
Puravelan's argument on Haidar's post as trustee in the Perdana Foundation but
not on his submission on Haidar's involvement in the Pura case.
On Shim, Lazar expressed concern over embarassment for him should the evidence
of his name being mentioned be abused during proceedings.
Lazar did not support Puravelan's submission against Zaitun.
When proceedings reconvened after lunch, all three commissioners decided against
discharging themselves.
Haidar said: "There is no valid ground to recuse myself (from these
proceedings)."
Shim said that at this juncture, he was not convinced of the reasons submitted
to discharge himself either.
However, he added: "I will reconsider my decision in the course of proceedings
if I should feel uncomfortable with the proceedings."
Zaitun said she was doing her duty as a government servant in the corruption
cases and that, in any case, "it was the court's decision, and not mine".
Today's six-and-a-half hour proceedings also saw facilitator DPP Datuk Nordin
Hassan submit a list of 17 names for witnesses to be called.
First to be called was ACA senior officer Shahadan Mohd Yatim who was assigned
last Dec 25 to take photographs of Lingam's home in Kelana Jaya where the video
clip was allegedly taken.
He testified that Lingam's living room matched that depicted in the video.
The DPP then tendered 17 photographs taken on that day.
The second witness was ACA senior investigation officer Chua Lay Choo who
testified that Shahadan acted on her instructions, and she agreed that the
photographs captured matched the image in the video clip.
She said she also instructed ACA officer Wan Zulkifli Wan Jusoh to send the
video clip to experts at CyberSecurity Malaysia and this was done on Dec 26. The
compact disc containing the clip was returned to her on Saturday (Jan 12).
During Chua's testimony, the full 14-minute-long video clip was shown to the
courtroom, which was packed with lawyers, journalists and a few observers.
Several witnesses, including Anwar and businessman Loh Mui Fah who had earlier
said his son was the one who shot the video clip, had turned up but they were
not in the courtroom.
Tmorrow, Loh, Sim, Sivarasa, Wan Zulkifli and Mohd Zabri Adil Talib and Anwar
are expected to be called.
Before entering the courtroom, visitors were subjected to a security scan by the
police.
All witnesses are allowed legal representation.
Lingam is represented by R. Thayalan and tycoon Tan Sri Vincent Tan by N.
Ravikumar while Anwar, PKR vice-president Sivarasa and PKR coordinator Sim are
represented by Puravelan and three other lawyers.
Former chief justice Tun Ahmad Fairuz Sheikh Abdul Halim is represented by
former Attorney-General Chambers' senior prosecutor Salehudin Saidin and two
lawyers, former chief justice Tun Mohamed Dzaiddin Abdullah by Khoo Huan Huat
and businessman Loh by Americk Singh Sidhu.
The Malaysian Bar is represented by Lazar, Yeo Yang Poh, Christopher Leong,
Ranjit Singh and Razlan Abdul while three NGOs - Aliran, Hakam and Suaram - are
represented by Azahar Haron and three other lawyers.
The commission was set up to ascertain the authenticity of the video clip;
identify the persons in the video clip; ascertain the truth or otherwise of the
content of the conversation in the video clip, determine whether there is any
misconduct and to recommend appropriate action against the person or persons
identified in the video clip if there is misconduct.
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