Malaysia’s Anwar seeks to remove sodomy case judge
(AFP/Yahoo News) – – Malaysian opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim moved Monday to have the judge in his sodomy trial disqualified, complaining he had refused to rein in biased media coverage.
The trial, which Anwar says is a plot to end his political career, began last week with graphic testimony from 24-year-old former aide Mohamad Saiful Bukhari Azlan who accuses Anwar of sodomising him.
Defence lawyers objected Friday when Utusan Malaysia, a Malay-language daily linked to the government, ran photographs of the court’s closed-door visit to the upscale apartment where the sexual encounter allegedly took place.
Judge Mohamad Zabidin Diah refused a request to admonish the daily over the photograph, as well as an earlier headline that said “Not willing to be sodomised again” which the defence said suggested they had sex more than once.
Anwar, who was jailed on separate sodomy and corruption charges a decade ago in a case widely seen as politically motivated, said in a statement to the High court there was a “real danger of bias” on the part of the judge.
“The local media has condemned me as they did in 1998 without (giving me a) chance to listen to my reply,” the 62-year-old opposition leader told reporters. “Clearly it’s a political trial.”
The judge adjourned the trial until Tuesday when he will hear the application to remove him from the proceedings.
However, the defence has lost several earlier legal manoeuvres including a bid to strike out the case, and to force the prosecution to release evidence including medical reports and closed-circuit TV footage.
“We feel there is an element of bias,” defence counsel Sankara Nair told reporters.
“My client is upset about it,” he added. “The judge doesn’t protect the client so how are we going to run a trial that is going to be fair and free?”
Anwar has said that the charges, which carry a penalty of 20 years imprisonment, are an attempt to end his political career and neutralise the threat he poses to the Barisan Nasional coalition government.
A married father-of-six, he was sacked as deputy prime minister in 1998 amid a power struggle with then-premier Mahathir Mohamad and spent six years in jail before the sex conviction was overturned.
After his release, he reinvigorated the opposition and led it to its best ever elections results in 2008 polls when it seized control of five states and a third of seats in national parliament.
