Former federal court judge Gopal Sri Ram has declined to comment on former attorney-general Mohamed Apandi Ali’s allegation that Sri Ram had tried to persuade him to arrange for an arrest of then prime minister Najib Abdul Razak in 2018.
“I decline to comment,” Sri Ram was quoted as saying by The Star Online today.
Yesterday, Apandi wrote in his Facebook posting that in January 2018, Sri Ram and an unnamed “young Chinese lawyer” had visited him at his house under some pretext of getting his help in unfreezing the accounts of a certain firm.
Sri Ram then admitted that it was only an excuse to see him, and that he was sent there by Dr Mahathir Mohamad to arrange for Najib’s arrest, Apandi claimed.
Apandi quoted Sri Ram as saying: “He (Mahathir) wants you to arrest Najib at his office, you go tomorrow at 2pm, we have arranged for the police in Putrajaya to do what is necessary on your instructions. We have also arranged for a magistrate to issue the remand order when he is brought before him or her.”
Sri Ram had also purportedly said that “we have laid the ground plans, all I need now is for you to agree,” Apandi wrote.
When asked on what grounds Najib was supposed to be arrested for, Sri Ram had allegedly replied that “people out there are frustrated and unhappy, the fact that you arrest him, never mind the reason, will make people happy.”
Apandi said after he had asked to think about it, Sri Ram and the young Chinese lawyer left the house.
He also claimed to have a CCTV recording as well as eyewitnesses to the alleged incident.
The alleged incident took place four months before the 14th general election where Barisan Nasional was defeated and Pakatan Harapan became the then-new government. – June 11, 2020
