Najib now a pawn in a political chess game
Speculation and the Najib option
Lots of speculation has once again re-emerged over a possible pardon for former prime minister Najib Razak. Najib is convicted and currently serving his 12 year jail sentence in Kajang Prison for abuse of power, money laundering, and criminal breach of trust (CBT) from the SRC International case.
This follows the recent UMNO Congress, where many of Najib’s loyal supporters demanded a pardon for him. Many within UMNO believe the party’s support for Anwar as prime minister was conditional upon pardoning Najib. Consequently, some are angry at UMNO president Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, himself facing criminal charges, has not done enough to secure Najib a pardon, and selling out his former leader.
The Najib pardon saga is at the very heart of survival for the Anwar government. What is at stake is not only whether Najib can walk out of Kajang Prison a free man, but whether Anwar can remain as prime minister for the full length of his term. There have been rumours and rumblings that if Najib is not pardoned, there could be a grassroots revolt against Zahid. There is strong sentiment about Najib fanned by his children within the party.
Selective persecution of Najib?
After Mahathir Mohamed defeated Najib at the polls and became prime minister, he went on a relentless quest to put Najib behind bars. Mahathir assembled the brightest legal people to frame up charges that would convict Najib. Najib’s home was raided with the contents confiscated in the raid put on public view, in order to turn the public against him.
Many within UMNO saw this as selective persecution of Najib.
The Johor Sultan made it clear that if Najib is not freed, he should not be in jail alone.
Some look at Najib’s conviction with the conjecture that he was sent to jail when he had no legal representation in front of the court.
This is what some within UMNO believe.
Is Najib a potential asset ‘on ice’?
Anwar has been very coy about any pardon for Najib. The pardons board has not yet officially considered the case. This is a stalling tactic. We all know how quickly Anwar was released after Mahathir became prime minister in 2018. Any immediate release of Najib could cause enough havoc to bring down the Anwar government, or at least make him extremely unpopular, which Anwar would avoid at all costs.
Time needs to go by so more would accept an early release from a pardon, or other legal manoeuvre.
There is also the issue of further charges against Najib, yet to be heard in court. If Najib was pardoned now, and later convicted through the ongoing charges, a second pardon would be required to keep him out of prison.
A pardon now is not a clean solution to Najib’s woes.
However, there is a complex game behind Najib’s continued incarceration in Kajang prison. Anwar effectively holds the key to Najib’s fate, through his advice to the Pardons Board.
Anwar has to balance out the two fields of pressure. One field is those in UMNO who are demanding an immediate pardon. The other field are those who would revolt if Najib was pardoned. This is all within a sea of public opinion, that would bring immense anger and tarnish credibility.
The practical consensus is that Najib would be pardoned around five years into his sentence. That would be after August 23, 2027. This would most probably be a pardon after GE16, where there wouldn’t be too much public outrage.
However, the coming state elections may play a determining role in the timing of a pardon for Najib. If UMNO is wiped out during the state elections (and Amanah and PKR as well), then how will PH-UMNO ever be able to win enough support in GE16 to muster a return of the government? Anwar would certainly know his days as prime minister are numbered.
PKR isn’t making inroads into the Malay heartlands. Amanah may cease to exist. Zahid certainly hasn’t been able to rebuild UMNO support. So that makes Najib the last option.
The Najib option
Many believe that Najib aka Bossku can rebuild UMNO. He has the charisma in the heartlands, and can charm the people in the kampongs. That’s at least what many in UMNO believe. If, PH-UMNO are decimated in the coming state elections, then the release of Najib through a pardon will be a hot option.
Najib’s release would be for the benefit of all sitting on the government benches. Under these circumstances, Najib is a strategic asset ‘on ice’ for when, and if he is needed. Thus, any pardon and release of Najib would be for practical purposes only, rather than pressure from UMNO.
Now all this is speculation, because Anwar himself has not made any final decision.
Originally published in My Sin Chew 19th June 2023
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What happened to DS Najib was the comlpete destruction of Malaysia's legal, constitutional and political system. His conviction and trial was a farce. Whether or not he is actually guilty (as opposed to guilt by an incompetent legal system) there is ample evidence that DS Najib upset the United States and the west in general. The tirades of abuse and allegations of misconduct in office directed against him by a well funded army of so called NGO's and political leaders from Singapore, to Australia and to the United States itself both directly, by innuendo and by implication of their well scripted statements point to something more sinister and dark than what meets the eye.
Najib himself by his wilful silence and his wife's very public ostentatious and loud behaviour aided those who sought to destroy the man and the office he held. His wife surrounded her self with 'leaky buckets'. The term applies to those who sought to enhance their personal standing socially and in their careers by claiming a close personal relationship with the first family, then bragging about it in exaggerated dimensions. There were those (professionals) who actually obtained first hand information about Najib and his family from meembers of Najib'ss household, information covered by privilege and meant to be confidential then released it to the public, to the media and to other third parties.
Najib's advisors were clearly chosseen by Najib and not himself. Thee criteria for being an advisor to Najib was that it needed to be approved by Datin Rosmah Mansor, hiss wife. The legal profession was at the heart of it all. Lawyers from the Malaysian Bar Council had been suborned by open societies and the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) to publicly defame the man and to direct allegations of murder against him (Altantuya) which went as far as paying for an Al Jazeera campaign smearing him with false allegations by various "witnesses" to the murder then publishing it in a worldwide documentary. The Wall Street Journal provided the services of two rather limp and pallid "journalists" to write a book (investigative journalism) about the whole affair including that of having received and spent state funds without proper authority.
The axe in the end fell in sheer desperation when the state prosecution could not by any means have succeeded in convicting him, breached all the rules of procedure and natural justice by denying the man his choice of legal representation, claiming that his request was "wasting time" and a ploy to delay the inevitable. That of itself should have rung warning bells in the legal community which it did not, a silence which should have of its own have raised further alarm bells ringing.
No sitting member of parliament, (Which Najib was at tthe time) can be tried in a court of law without first being brought before a parliamentary committee for the purpose to be examined with all the evidence laid before it. Not to do so is akin to bringing the King before the courts. This omission of itself demonstrates how the office of he Agong had become corrupted.
All parliamentarians and judges and certain other offices held under the crown enjoy a certain degree of immunity and indemnity from prosecution during their term in office and beyond for acts and omissions done during their terms on office. It is more than a mere convention of the constitution. Yet none of the DPP (aa self proclaimed constitutional expert) and a former court of appeal judge the late Sri Ram Gopal and Tommy Thomas were both oblivious to the breach and procedural failure as was the Chief Justice of Malaysia.
There were other fatal flaws such as the wanton refusal or omission to call Jho Teik Low the man in the middle of the 1MDB saga. It is often been said that Jho Low's (as the witness was often referred to) whereabouts was unknown. But he did have a legal representative in Malaysia.
The court could have on a proper application by the DPP or of its own power approved an order for substituted service on Jho Low's lawyers. It did not. Attempts at securing other critical material witnesses such as the former governor of the Bank Negara were scuttled so easily by the prosecution when it was abundantly clear that she was a witness who could have provided the smoking gun to the trial.
None of the judges in the trial of DS Najib were clearly impartial or competent. What's more disturbing is that the Malaysian Legal fraternity was deafeningly silent in this matter that pointed to coercion to silence or just general ignorance and incompetence in the law on the part of the profession.
There was a conspiracy to bring DS Najib down and it could only have been planned and executed from within with the aid of foreign forces. From these limited examples of critical omissions on the part of the justice system in Malaysia, the conviction of DS Najib remains unsound and unreliable.
Najib is no pawn - he is the puppet master. Backed by stolen billions, he is financing an operation to try and buy his way out of the Kajang Palace. He calls the shots, he does not look for sympathy.