KUCHING, Jan 25: Parti Pesaka Bumiputera Bersatu (PBB) information chief Datuk Idris Buang has taken a swipe at Democratic Action Party Socialist Youth (Dapsy) Sarawak publicity secretary Abdul Aziz Isa for discrediting Chief Minister Datuk Patinggi Abang Johari Tun Openg for echoing the idea of including Native Court in the main judiciary.
Idris said the idea may have been from Chief Justice of Malaysia Tan Sri Richard Malanjum but anything involving amendments to the Federal Constitution or the Court Judicature Act or otherwise creation of any other federal act or acts of Parliament in order to realise that proposal would necessarily require the State Assembly concerned to consent to it before it can be implemented in the said state.
“In this respect, Article 76(2) of the Federal Constitution is relevant, along with Article 161E. Therefore, it is correct for the chief minister (Abang Johari) to say that he and the state government were committed to upgrade the Native Courts along the line profounded by the Chief Justice.
“I, therefore, urge Abdul Aziz, Dapsy’s spokesman, not to attack our chief minister blindly just for the sake of very cheap publicity and without understanding how our legislative as well as legal system work.
“The Malay proverb had it that ‘kalau kail hanya senjengkal, lautan dalam janganlah nak dicuba’,” warned Buang in a statement.
Abdul Aziz recently said the proposal to elevate Native Court came from Malanjum and not Abang Johari or the Gabungan Parti Sarawak (GPS) government.
He said Malanjum made the proposal that the status of native courts be raised to the same level as civil and syariah courts during the Borneo Rainforest Law Conference 2019 in Kota Kinabalu last week.
“When Abang Johari made a statement that the Sarawak government is committed to upgrading the Native Court in Sarawak to be equivalent to the civil and Syariah courts, I found it merely rhetoric and insincere as he was just echoing Malanjum. It was not even Abang Johari’s brainchild in the first place.
“If Malanjum did not make this proposal, will the chief minister ever think of coming out with such proposal?” asked Abdul Aziz. — DayakDaily
