PUTRAJAYA, May 26 (NNN-BERNAMA) — Malaysia’s Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department\u00a0Datuk Liew Vui Keong today denied allegations that he had interfered with\u00a0the decision of Singapore\u2019s Court of Appeal\u00a0to stay the execution of\u00a0Malaysian citizen Pannir Selvam Pranthaman.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In a statement, Liew said he had spoken to Singapore’s Senior Minister in the Ministry of Law last Wednesday on Pannir’s case, as he was unable to speak to Home Affairs and Law Minister K. Shanmugam, who was unavailable at that time. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Liew said he also sought the foreign minister\u2019s blessings to communicate with the Singapore government and to write an email to them where he made a representation based on valid legal grounds. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
“The allegation that I have interfered with their judicial system is totally unfounded and baseless. It\u2019s purely a figment of an imagination on someone\u2019s part,” said Liew, who is in charge of law and parliamentary affairs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Liew said he was issuing the statement to place the narrative in a correct perspective to avoid further confusion and unnecessary innuendos from some people as there have been some serious allegations made against him by certain quarters across the causeway.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Explaining further, Liew said Pannir had applied for a stay of his execution last Wednesday by challenging the prosecution\u2019s failure to issue\u00a0a certificate on his claim that he had assisted the Singapore police during the investigation to deter a drug activity there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The 32-year-old Malaysian also challenged the rejection of the petition for clemency by the Singapore President which according to Pannir was only served to him on May 17, 2019, the same day his sister was notified of his impending execution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“The hearing of the motion was fixed on Thursday at 2.30 pm before the Singapore\u2019s Court of Appeal which, having heard the submissions from Pannir\u2019s two counsels who were engaged, on pro bono basis, just an hour before the hearing, allowed the stay of execution and the scheduled execution on Friday was then aborted immediately,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Liew said even though he has not had the benefit of reading the grounds of the decision, it was obvious that the Singapore court made its decision after having considered the prevailing circumstances and the rule of law applicable to the case. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
“It is therefore equally untenable to allege that there\u2019s an interference on my part to their judicial process.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“I, and so does everyone here in Malaysia, respect the decision of the Singapore\u2019s Court,” Liew said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Pannir, convicted of drug trafficking, was originally scheduled to hang last Friday, before Singapore\u2019s Court of Appeal allowed last Thursday a stay of the execution to enable him to challenge the refusal of clemency.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Pannir was convicted on June 27, 2017 by the Singapore High Court of trafficking in 51.84g of diamorphine at the Woodlands Checkpoint on Sept 3, 2014.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
PUTRAJAYA, May 26 (NNN-BERNAMA) — Malaysia’s Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department\u00a0Datuk Liew Vui Keong today denied allegations that he had interfered with\u00a0the decision of Singapore\u2019s Court of Appeal\u00a0to stay the execution of\u00a0Malaysian citizen Pannir Selvam Pranthaman. In a statement, Liew said he had spoken to Singapore’s Senior Minister in the Ministry of Law last Wednesday on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":26169,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[288],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26168"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/19"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=26168"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26168\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/26169"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=26168"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=26168"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=26168"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}