Home Minister Saifuddin Nasution Ismail says putting former prime minister Najib Razak under house arrest before the courts resolve conflicting readings of a High Court discharge order could amount to wrongful detention, and that the question will be taken to court.
Speaking to reporters in Melaka on Monday (Nov 9), Saifuddin said his ministry was caught between two instructions. The conditional pardon granted to Najib allows him to serve the rest of his sentence in the SRC International case under house arrest once his RM50 million fine is paid, while the Order of Discharge issued by the Kuala Lumpur High Court uses the word “discharge”, which can be read as a release.
He said the difference decides who has authority over Najib. Under house arrest, Najib would still be serving his sentence and the Prisons Department would keep custody of him at a gazetted residence instead of Kajang Prison. A full discharge would mean the department no longer has any authority over him. If the court reads the order as a release and Najib has been placed under house arrest in the meantime, Saifuddin said, the authorities could face a wrongful detention claim.
Saifuddin stressed that the ministry was not challenging the decision of the Federal Territories Pardons Board or the constitutional powers of the Yang di-Pertuan Agong. He said the ministry had received the letter from the board’s secretariat, would comply with it, and had not changed or disputed a single word of the decision.
The ministry has asked the Attorney-General for an opinion, and Saifuddin said the courts were the best place to settle the matter when there are two possible interpretations. He said the ministry would respect whatever the court decides. Asked when the matter would be filed, he said he had no information yet on the timing or on which party would bring it to court.
Umno said on Nov 6 that it had paid Najib’s RM50 million fine, which under the pardon should have allowed him to move to house arrest. The Attorney-General’s Chambers then asked for the move to be deferred until the conflicting terms in the court order are clarified, saying it was not disputing the pardon itself but wanted the court to decide the effect of the discharge order. Attorney-General Dusuki Mokhtar has also said the order contains obvious errors in its legal terms and provisions, while Istana Negara said on Nov 7 that the conditional pardon is clear and must be complied with.
Najib remains in Kajang Prison while the question is unresolved. How the court reads the discharge order will decide where he serves the rest of his sentence and whether the Prisons Department keeps authority over him, a question the government says only the court can settle.
Update: The High Court set aside the disputed discharge order on Tuesday (Nov 10) and issued a fresh one, and Najib began his house arrest at his Taman Duta home that night.