KUALA LUMPUR: Court of Appeal proceedings shifted to virtual hearing today to keep the judicial system running as the Movement Control Order (MCO) to curb the spread of Covid-19 is still in force.
This is the first in Malaysia's history that court proceedings were live-streamed to the public.
Today, the appeals involving three individuals against a transportation company was conducted remotely via video conference which could be viewed at the judiciary's official website www.kehakiman.gov.my.
The live-streamed proceedings which started at 10am showed a three-man Court of Appeal bench, lawyers and a deputy registrar going into the listed matters from their homes and offices.
The bench presiding over the appeals comprised Datuk Kamardin Hashim who led judges Datuk Lee Swee Seng and Datuk Azizah Nawawi.
The civil appeals involved Zhoa Fangliang, Jin Haifang and Zhu Cunhua against Syarikat Pengangkutan Satu Hati Sdn Bhd.
The appeals was heard together since they involved the same facts and question of law.
Lawyer K.F. Ee represented the three appellants while lawyers Azizi Mohd Sarit@Ahmad Shaghir and Nurul Dalilah Darmawi represented the company.
Before proceedings began, parties stated their agreement on the mode of hearing via live streaming.
The appeals concerned a case involving a bus crash in Johor on Oct 7, 2015, in which four tourists from China were killed.
In the proceedings which took about an hour and 15 minutes, the bench unanimously dismissed the appeals on grounds that there was no merit.
The Chief Registrar's Office had in a statement yesterday said there had been certain cases that were conducted online and now the judiciary was taking a step further by introducing the live streaming pilot project.
It was reported that the majority of court proceedings including several criminal hearings against senior politicians were halted or has been rescheduled since March due to the MCO.