IGP granted leave to initiate committal proceedings against Papagomo again
Judicial Commissioner Gan Techiong granted the leave after hearing submissions on Razarudin's application to initiate committal proceedings against Wan Azr i, also known as Papagomo, for breaching the terms of the apology previously ordered by the High Court.
Earlier, the court was told that Wan Azri's apology to Razarudin was described as insincere and a joke.
Razarudin's lawyer, Raam Kumar, said Azri had uploaded the apology to his social media accounts on 30 April, using Maafkan Kami, a song by the late Tan Sri P.Ramlee from the classic film Pendekar Bujang Lapok, as background music.
"The apology is a joke. Why do we say this? This is a court order. There must be solemnity. You must be serious.
"The apology was not re-read, not in still (image) and not done in good faith.
"There is no solemnity at all. This is a court matter, not some joke where you play music.
"The unconditional apology is not sincere and he had not purged his contempt," Raam said.
Raam also said Wan Azri had also committed contempt of court by uploading
videos on his YouTube and TikTok accounts explaining his apology in court.
"The apology is unconditional, which means the defendant (Wan Azri) cannot make excuses for his apology.
"He is supposed to apologise with no conditions attached and he should just keep quiet. Rather than that, he published the videos.
"He had said he did not apologise to the IGP, but to the court. He is not acknowledging at all that he has an issue with the IGP, but he is fighting with the court.
"In other words, he is not acknowledging at all his contemptuous action against the plaintiff (Razarudin).
"He had also said he apologised because he did not want to be jailed. But nowhere in our affidavit or submission we askedfor him to be jailed in Sungai Buloh Prison.
"It is mere insertion as we asked only for committal. The issue of the plaintiff wanting to send him to prison did not arise. This is a made up story," he said.
Lawyer Muhammad Rafique Rashid Ali said they had sent a letter to Raam's firm, stating that they published the apologies on YouTube, TikTok, X and Telegram; and had removed the Jan 14 and 15 defamatory statements.
"The court should take judicial notice that not only was the apology tendered in open court, not only was the apology put up in social media and remaining now, it has been vastly reported by the mainstream media, which confirmed Wan Azri apologised to the IGP," he said.
Gan had also questioned Azri's action, saying that the matter should have been over when the first committal proceedings ended.
"Why did he not let the matter rest? Why did he publish that video, which is quite negative?" he said.
After hearing the submissions, Gan said, "I am of the mind to grant leave for this application."
The court set 30 June for the inter partes hearing.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Sun
23 minutes ago
- The Sun
Mother of Dutch model awarded RM1.1m for negligence in daughter's death probe
KUALA LUMPUR: The High Court here today awarded RM1.1 million in damages to the mother of Dutch model Ivana Esther Robert Smit, whose nude body was found on the sixth-floor balcony of a condominium here eight years ago. Christina Carolina Gerarda Johanna Verstappen had sued the Inspector-General of Police, Dang Wangi investigating officer ASP Faizal Abdullah, the Home Minister, and the Malaysian government for alleged breach of statutory duties and negligence in the investigation into the cause of her daughter's death. In her judgment, Judge Roz Mawar Rozain ordered the defendants to pay RM500,000 in general damages, RM300,000 in aggravated damages, and RM300,000 in exemplary damages to Verstappen. - Bernama
Malay Mail
23 minutes ago
- Malay Mail
Dutch model Ivana Smit's mother awarded RM1.1m over police negligence in death probe
KUALA LUMPUR, July 29 — The High Court here today awarded RM1.1 million in damages to the mother of Dutch model Ivana Esther Robert Smit, whose nude body was found on the sixth-floor balcony of a condominium here eight years ago. Christina Carolina Gerarda Johanna Verstappen had sued the Inspector-General of Police, Dang Wangi investigating officer ASP Faizal Abdullah, the Home Minister, and the Malaysian government for alleged breach of statutory duties and negligence in the investigation into the cause of her daughter's death. In her judgment, Judge Roz Mawar Rozain ordered the defendants to pay RM500,000 in general damages, RM300,000 in aggravated damages, and RM300,000 in exemplary damages to Verstappen. — Bernama
The Star
27 minutes ago
- The Star
China's rebound has a distinct ‘cool factor'
THE first seven months of 2025 have delivered a whirlwind of news on Chinese technology and business, oscillating between anxiety and euphoria, but what has cut through the noise has been the emergence of a 'cool factor'. In January, TikTok suspended its US services for one day, when the outgoing administration shut down the app due to its ties to China, before the decision was swiftly reversed by the incoming Trump administration. Days later, Chinese artificial intelligence (AI) company DeepSeek shocked the world with its cost-effective, high-performance R-1 reasoning model, triggering an intense debate about who will lead the 'AI race'. And then in early May, US-China tensions reached unprecedented heights, as tariffs jumped above 100%, effectively halting bilateral trade, before de-escalation. By summer, however, China was once again exporting critical rare earth to the United States and Nvidia had re-started the sales of its AI chips to China, suggesting a burgeoning trade detente between the world's two largest economies. Amid this volatility, China's capital markets have responded favourably. The MSCI China Index has surged around 25% year-to-date through July 25, outpacing the MSCI All-Country World index's 12% gain and the S&P 500 index's 9% rise. Notably, this strong performance has been driven not just by typical business-cycle fluctuations, but also an appeal rooted in innovation, collaboration and youth culture, suggesting China's next growth cycle could look very different from those in the past. Imitator to innovator China's evolution from low-cost imitator to global innovator is epitomised by its electric vehicle (EV) dominance. Chinese EV leader BYD, which began as a battery maker and currently has a market cap of US$150bil, was once dismissed by Elon Musk for its unattractive products and weak technology. However, a decade of development, supported by state-backed infrastructure including China's 10-million-strong charging network, has propelled BYD past Musk's Tesla in global sales. In 2024, one of every five EVs sold globally was from BYD, whose market share is now double that of Tesla's. Moreover, BYD's vehicles, like many other Chinese EVs, now boast the type of sleek designs and novel amenities associated with its US rival. Beyond product innovations, some Chinese companies are also experimenting with new business models and sales strategies. For example, livestream social shopping, which was pioneered by Alibaba, has been adopted by Amazon, Instagram, YouTube and even Walmart (in collaboration with TikTok) in the US to target Gen-Z and millennial shoppers. New players like Chinese toymaker Pop Mart are also experimenting with fresh business models. Its designer toys are sold in mystery boxes, where sealed packages conceal randomised plush Labubu figures, which adorn the luxury handbags of many influencers. This strategy seeks to tap into the thrill of uncertainty, creating viral demand beyond the Chinese domestic market. And this appears to be working. Pop Mart's sales from outside mainland China contributed to nearly 40% of its total revenue in 2024, and its profit in the first half of 2025 is expected to soar by at least 350% year-on-year. Open-source architect Historically, tensions surrounding intellectual property have dogged China's global trade relationships. Today, however, its embrace of open-source collaboration appears to signal a profound shift. China is now the fastest-growing and second-largest contributor of open-source code on GitHub, the world's leading platform for software collaboration. Moreover, Chinese tech giants like Huawei and Tencent rank among the top corporate sponsors of Apache and Linux foundations, major non-profit organisations that shape foundational technologies like AI and cloud computing. DeepSeek's R-1 model exemplifies this strategy. Released under the permissive MIT licence, it grants large-scale commercial reuse rights (unlike Google's Apache 2.0 or Meta's Llama licences) and has fuelled countless derivative models globally. Such openness has the potential to build developer loyalty, influence AI standards, and circumvent geopolitical friction. This shift has been underpinned by a focus on developing scientific prowess. In 2024, China led the world in high-quality research publications, according to Nature, holding the top spot for the second consecutive year. Its advantage in publications extends even to semiconductor design and fabrication, a field where US technological superiority is often assumed, with Chinese scholars authoring over half of the most-cited papers in this field in 2024. Structural headwinds However, the outlook for the country's businesses is not all rosy. Industrial profits are still shrinking, falling 1.1% year-to-date, despite various government stimulus measures, including a recently expanded consumer subsidy scheme and a central bank-backed initiative for state-owned enterprises to buy unsold homes. And price wars in sectors such as EVs and food delivery have gotten so brutal that the authorities have stepped in to mediate 'irrational' competition. Another structural issue is the country's stubbornly high youth unemployment rate (16-24-year olds excluding students), which remained at 14.5% – well above the 5% rate for the labour force as a whole. If China's future growth is to be driven more by a 'cool' factor, then the career prospects of its youth need to be strong enough to support their distinct consumption preferences as well as their entrepreneurial endeavours. Regardless of these challenges, innovation and open collaboration still have the potential to reshape China's global identity. Importantly, economic growth driven by these factors may be more evenly distributed and idiosyncratic, and therefore less cyclical, compared to China's old economic engines of real estate, infrastructure and production capacity investments. No longer just the world's factory, China is becoming a source of culturally resonant innovation. And as America's track record over the past decades suggests, no one should underestimate the value of cool. — Reuters Taosha Wang is a portfolio manager and creator of the Thematically Thinking newsletter at Fidelity International. The views expressed here are the writer's own.
