KUALA LUMPUR: An Instagram posting by Datuk Seri Dr Ahmad Zahid Hamidi's daughter on his ongoing corruption trial has enraged the prosecution, leading to the Umno president's lawyers issuing an apology to the High Court today.
Moments after the issue was raised in court, Nurul Hidayah also immediately posted an apology and promised not to repeat what she had done.
However, Judge Datuk Collin Lawrence Sequerah was hardly amused by what had happened and warned that the court would not tolerate any subjudicial comments while the trial is ongoing.
"This is hardly a small matter. This court has to issue a warning that comments of subjudicial nature should not be made while this trial is ongoing," he snapped after hearing about what Nurul Hidayah had done.
Earlier, at the onset of today's hearing, Deputy Public Prosecutor (DPP) Datuk Raja Rozela Raja Toran brought up the issue of Nurul Hidayah's posting on the latter's Instagram account nurul.zahid.
The DPP complained that Nurul Hidayah had uploaded a posting which was prejudicial to the prosecution.
"She has made baseless accusations about the ongoing trial, making absurd claims like we amended Section 30(7) of the Malaysian Anti Corruption (MACC) Act just to ensure the prosecution against Zahid could go on.
"She also claimed that the prosecution had admitted that there was no evidence of corruption (in Zahid's case), and that it was all purely slander.
"Obviously, we have never made such a statement...we haven't even started our arguments. This is a blatant lie and she is obviously very ignorant of the law," Raja Rozela said.
The DPP then urged Collin to issue a prohibition order against Nurul Hidayah to bar her from uploading any more such postings.
However, she said while the prosecution viewed the matter very seriously, it did not want to initiate contempt proceedings just yet.
Zahid's lawyer Hamidi Mohd Noh later said the defence had just been alerted to the issue and would look into it.
"We will first apologise and we will ask the author to remove the posting if it is the court's will," he said.
Nurul Hidayah in her posting spoke about the immunity arguments which her father's lawyers had raised in his ongoing trial.
She started off her comments by stating that she wanted to clear the air about the immunity issue to those who did not understand it or "were just too lazy to read".
The 42-year old then went on to state that her father had given statements to the MACC in July 2018 at a time when Section 30(7) had yet to be amended.
She argued that this meant those who did so were automatically immune from prosecution.
However, she went on to say that the prosecution had amended Section 30(7) just to ensure it could continue with its intention to prosecute Zahid.
"It is because the prosecution wanted to carry on with its intention to prosecute my father, they decided to amend Section 30(7) on Oct 1, 2018.
"However, my father is still entitled to be immune from prosecution because he had given his statement to the MACC in July 2018.
"This is even more so when all the star witnesses called by the prosecution had also stated that there was no element of corruption involved and it was all fitnah (slander)."
Checks on Nurul Hidayah's Instagram account later showed she had uploaded an apology which read:
"I would apologise (sic) to the court for postings made. I should not share or commented (sic) what transpired during the proceedings.
"It will not happen again. All the best to both, prosecution vs defence."
It was reported that in the submissions on Monday, Zahid lead counsel Hisyam Teh Poh Teik had argued that his client wanted to seek immunity from prosecution under Section 30(7) of the MACC Act.
He argued that Zahid should be granted immunity for 46 of the 47 charges he is facing due to protection given in the now-repealed law to those who provide information to the graft busters.
Under Section 30(7), it is generally stated that any person who discloses any information shall not be prosecuted due to the disclosing of such information, except for making a false or misleading information.
Section 30(7) was repealed in October 2018 but was still in force in July the same year when zahid spoke to and had his statements recorded by the MACC.
Zahid, 68, is facing 47 charges, including 12 for CBT, eight for corruption and 27 for money laundering involving RM31 million of Yayasan Akalbudi funds.
For the 12 CBT charges, Zahid was alleged to have used the funds to make payments for personal credit cards, insurance policies and license for his personal vehicles, remittances to a law firm and contributions to the Royal Malaysian police football association.
The charge, under Section 409 of the Penal Code, carries a maximum 20 years jail, whipping and fine.