Malanjum’s appointment an important milestone – Lim
KOTA KINABALU: DAP national advisor Lim Kit Siang has described the appointment of Tan Sri Richard Malanjum from Sabah as the Chief Justice of Malaysia as an important milestone that restored constitutional integrity and propriety and promoted national unity in the country.
He said Malanjum’s appointment righted an injustice that took place a year ago when the Prime Minister’s Department extended the tenure of Tan Sri Raus Sharif for the position instead of appointing Malanjum who was then the most senior federal court judge in the country.
He said that it must be a matter of grave concern to all patriotic Malaysians that the integrity and sanctity of the Malaysian Constitution was receiving less and less respect from the powersthat-be, the latest example being the illegal and unconstitutional extension of the tenures of Tan Sri Raus Sharif and Tan Sri Zulkefli Ahmad Makinudin as Chief Justice and Court of Appeal president on August 3 and September 27, 2017, respectively.
Kit Siang said the extension of the tenures of Raus and Zulkefli was not only unconstitutional, but would affect the promotional opportunities and prospects of at least eight Federal Court judges, including three women.
Kit Siang who is Iskandar Puteri MP, in a statement yesterday, said the most glaring injustice of the extensions was the denial of Malanjum as the first Chief Judge of Sabah and Sarawak to be appointed as Chief Justice of Malaysia.
Malanjum, 65, was sworn to the position before the Yang DiPertuan Agong on Wednesday.
Born in Tuaran in 1952, he is the first Sabah native to be appointed a High Court judge on July 26, 2006, and the first Sabahan to be elevated as a judge of the Court of Appeal and Federal Court, the apex court of the country, in 2005 at the age of 52.
He also became the first Sabahan to be elevated as fourth chief judge of the High Court of Sabah and Sarawak, a post that was previously held by a British, Peninsular Malaysian and Sarawak judge respectively.
Malanjum is a more senior Federal Court judge than Raus and Zulkefli by six years, as both Raus and Zulkefli were only elevated as Federal Court judges in September 2011.