By Dorcas Ting
KUCHING, Jul 14: The Court of Appeal has cleared the way for appeals by Toh Puan Datuk Patinggi Raghad Kurdi Taib and RHB Investment Bank Berhad (RHB) in the Cahya Mata Sarawak Berhad (CMS) share dispute to proceed, after dismissing an application seeking to strike them out.
In a 2-1 majority decision, the appellate court ruled that the appeals raised substantive legal issues, including questions over jurisdiction and the respondents’ legal standing, which should be determined at a full hearing.
The respondents, Dato Sri Sulaiman Abdul Rahman and Dato Sri Mahmud Abu Bekir, are sons of the late former Sarawak governor Tun Pehin Sri Abdul Taib Mahmud.
The three-member bench comprised Justices Datuk Dr Wan Alwi Abdul Wahab, Datuk Ahmad Kamal Mohd Shahid and Muniandy Kannyapan. Wan Alwi and Ahmad Kamal formed the majority, while Justice Muniandy dissented.
The majority dismissed the respondents’ bid to strike out the appeals and ordered them to pay RM25,000 in costs for each appeal to the appellants.
Justice Muniandy, in his dissenting judgment, took the view that the appeals were not legally maintainable because they challenged an interlocutory High Court decision, which he held was not appealable under the law.
With the application dismissed, the Court of Appeal will later fix a date to hear the substantive appeals against the High Court’s refusal to refer the dispute to the Syariah Court.
The dispute arose from a lawsuit filed by Sulaiman and Abu Bekir over the ownership and transfer of CMS shares, naming Raghad and RHB as defendants.
The appeals stem from an April 17, 2025, High Court ruling by then Judicial Commissioner Datuk Alexander Siew How Wai, who held that the civil court had jurisdiction to hear the case involving the transfer of 50 million CMS shares to Raghad.
Siew dismissed preliminary objections by Raghad and RHB, who argued that the matter should instead be heard in the Syariah Court as it involved a claim of ‘harta sepencarian’ (joint matrimonial property).
In his decision, Siew found that the jurisdictional objection had not been pleaded in the defendants’ original court filings but was introduced only during oral submissions in support of their application to strike out the suit.
He also found no evidence that the late Taib had ever claimed the shares as joint matrimonial property. The defendants, he noted, had not called witnesses or produced documentary evidence to support that argument.
Sulaiman and Abu Bekir allege that the disputed 50 million CMS shares were unlawfully transferred from the estate of their late mother, Datuk Patinggi Laila Taib, who held 111 million CMS shares before her death in 2009.
Having found the dispute fell within the jurisdiction of the civil courts, Siew allowed the lawsuit to proceed.
Sulaiman and Abu Bekir were represented by counsel Alvin Chong, while Raghad was represented by Alvin Yong and RHB by Tan Kee Heng. — DayakDaily
