Jailed ex-deputy prime minister Anwar Ibrahim has asked Chief Justice (CJ) Ahmad Fairuz Sheikh to set an early hearing date in relation to the application to review his conviction and sentence for corruption.

Lawyer Sankara Nair said Anwar was disappointed with the Federal Court's seven-month delay and had instructed him to send a letter asking for the matter to be expedited.

"We feel that the court has no reason to defer hearing the case any longer," he said when contacted today.

In the letter, Anwar said his application had been pending for "far too long", and urged the CJ to set a hearing date promptly.

The last time the matter was mentioned was on March 18, where the court adjourned the case, following a request by Attorney-General Abdul Gani Patail for a five-member panel, instead of three, to hear the application.

In August last year, Anwar filed an application seeking leave to have the court review its own decision which upheld the High Court verdict on April 14, 1999.

On July 10 last year, then Chief Justice Mohamed Dzaiddin Abdullah, Sabah and Sarawak Chief judge Steve Shim and Justice Haidar Mohd Nor (now the Chief Judge of Malaya) had upheld a decision by High Court judge S Augustine Paul (now a Court of Appeal judge) to sentence Anwar to six years' jail for corrupt practice.

While there is no other avenue for appeal over a decision by the Federal Court, aggrieved parties can apply to the same court for a review of its decision.

Grounds of application

In a separate development, Sankara said he had filed an application with the Court of Appeal today seeking review of the dismissal of Anwar's appeal against the sodomy conviction.

The application, filed at the court registry in Kuala Lumpur this afternoon, contained 24 grounds alleging that the dismissal was flawed.

Among others matters, Anwar claimed that the grounds of judgment by Justices Pajan Singh Gill, Richard Malanjum and Hashim Mohd Yusof revealed "a series of misdirections that must be corrected".

The judges had earlier upheld the decision by High Court judge Arifin Jaka (now a Court of Appeal judge) to convict him and his adopted brother Sukma Darmawan Sasmitaat Madja for sodomising Azizan Abu Bakar.

Anwar was sentenced to nine years' jail while Sukma was jailed six years and ordered to be whipped four times.