Umno lawyer Shafee to represent RoS in DAP election dispute, says lawyer
V. Anbalagan, TMI
Umno lawyer Tan Sri Shafee Abdullah will appear for the Registrar of Societies (RoS) in a judicial review application brought against the DAP over the party’s internal polls.
DAP lawyer Gobind Singh Deo said he came to know about Shafee (pic) being engaged by the RoS today during a case management exercise for the judicial review application before a High Court in Kuala Lumpur.
“A lawyer from Shafee’s legal firm told the High Court registrar that the senior lawyer will represent the RoS in the case,” Gobind said today.
On March 26, judge Datuk Zaleha Yusof granted the DAP leave to challenge the RoS’s refusal to recognise the party’s elected office bearers on its central executive committee (CEC) last September.
Gobind, who is DAP’s legal bureau chairman, said the judicial review application could be heard in the second half of the year although specific dates had yet to be fixed.
Another case management has been fixed on July 11.
Meanwhile, several lawyers said Attorney General Tan Sri Abdul Gani Patail could have issued a fiat for Shafee to represent the RoS since it was a government agency.
The DAP is challenging the decision of the RoS, saying its decision was unlawful.
The party filed the judicial review application in January to challenge the legality of ROS’s decision not to recognise the CEC.
On December 6, ROS informed DAP secretary-general Lim Guan Eng of its decision, advising the newly elected CEC to refrain from making any decisions on behalf of the party, while it probed complaints over the September 29 re-election.
Gobind, who is also the Puchong MP, said the RoS’s directive was without the force of law.
He said RoS had made the decision without first informing the DAP of the details of the complaints, or giving the party an opportunity to respond.
Gobind added that on December 20, DAP requested RoS to explain under which law its decision was based on.
