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“The new rules aim to simplify and speed up the process of taking cases through the courts. For example, one party may produce a hundred cheques as evidence. But if both parties agree that the same person signed all the cheques, then only one cheque need be produced,” Zaki told StarBiz.

The changes are modelled after a similar reform undertaken by Britain in 1999 under the Woolf Reforms, named after Lord Woolf who was given the task of changing the civil law system in England and Wales. Zaki said Australia, Hong Kong and the United States also had similar improvements in their legal procedural system.

“The law of evidence for criminal cases today requires that every tiny fact must be proven by the prosecution. That is the law. So we are looking at amending the law to allow the defendant to admit certain facts, which will hopefully speed up the hearing of the case.”

The changes are part of a bigger plan by Zaki to clear the backlog of cases and improve the efficiency of the judiciary.

In September, Zaki launched two New Commercial Courts (NCC) to speed up the disposal of commercial cases.

“Cases at the NCC will move fast and are expected to be disposed of within nine months,” he said.

Also in the pipeline are changes to expand the jurisdiction of the Magistrates and Sessions courts to handle cases where the amount in dispute is larger than currently permitted. The plan involves increasing the amount from a maximum of RM250,000 currently, to a cap of RM1mil for the Sessions court and to raise the limit to RM100,000 (from RM25,000 presently).

“This is to take into account the effects of inflation. The rules were last made more than 10 years ago,” added Chief Judge of the High Court of Malaya Tan Sri Arifin Zakaria.

Zaki’s moves to speed up the backlog of cases had, however, attracted criticism from lawyers that the changes were being introduced at the expense of justice. In response to this, Zaki said that he expected difficulties at the beginning, especially for lawyers to get used to the new policy of the courts not granting postponements as easily as it had been done in the past.

“I expect that the ‘water will find its own level’ after a while. When a new system is introduced, people either do not understand the system or intentionally resist the new system,” Zaki said.