KUALA LUMPUR: The High Court here has allowed an application by Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin to transfer his case on power abuse and money laundering from the Sessions Court to the High Court.
Justice Muhammad Jamil Hussin made the decision after hearing submissions from parties in the case yesterday.
“I have deliberated on the submissions. The applicant has fulfilled the threshold for his case to be transferred and tried at the High Court under Section 417(1)(b) of the Criminal Procedure Code.
“The three legal questions (raised from the charges) are questions of law that are extraordinarily difficult,” he said.
Justice Muhammad Jamil said while he has full confidence that the Sessions Court judge has the expertise and knowledge to preside over the case, he felt it was “more expedient” for the legal questions to be determined by the High Court.
“I hereby allow the application,” the judge said.
The court fixed July 14 for case management at the High Court.
In the application filed on April 4, Muhyiddin said there were complex legal issues and questions of unusual difficulty that were expected to arise, particularly regarding the constitutionality of several provisions in the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) Act.
According to the Bersatu president, the case in question was of public interest that had attracted the attention of the general public and received extensive media coverage at home and abroad, and it would not cause any prejudice to the prosecution if the application was allowed.
On April 27, 2023, Muhyiddin filed an application to transfer the case from the Sessions Court to the High Court, but on July 10 of the same year, he withdrew the application.
He made a second application to transfer the case in May this year.
Muhyiddin, 77, as the Prime Minister (at the time) and Bersatu president, was charged with four counts of using his position to obtain bribes totalling RM232.5mil in connection with the Jana Wibawa Project from three companies, namely Bukhary Equity Sdn Bhd, Nepturis Sdn Bhd and Mamfor Sdn Bhd, as well as Datuk Azman Yusoff, for the party.
He was charged with committing the offence at the Prime Minister’s Office, Bangunan Perdana Putra in Putrajaya between March 1, 2020 and Aug 20, 2021.
Muhyiddin also faces three charges of receiving proceeds from illegal activities totalling RM200mil from Bukhary Equity Sdn Bhd, which were deposited into Bersatu’s Ambank and CIMB Bank accounts.
The offence was allegedly committed at separate locations at AmBank, Amcorp Mall branch, Petaling Jaya on Jan 7, 2022 and CIMB Bank, Menara KL branch, Jalan Stesen Sentral, here between Feb 25 and July 16, 2021 and Feb 8 and July 8, 2022.
