The Kuala Lumpur High Court today granted a fresh injunction to senior lawyer Muhammad Shafee Abdullah in place of the ex-parte injunction barring the Malaysian Bar from discussing his alleged misconduct following his roadshows held in the Anwar Ibrahim case.

This follows Justice Asmabi Mohamad granting the new injunction to replace the ex-parte injunction which ends on April 3 and this new injunction would be extended until the disposal of the Umno-linked lawyer's suit.

Justice Asmabi granted the injunction in her chambers despite objections from Malaysian Bar lawyers Lambert Rasa-Ratnam and lawyers representing Tommy Thomas and former Court of Appeal judge VC George.

Today's development was related by Shafee's lawyer Kamarul Hisham Kamaruddin and also Ambiga Sreenevasan who appeared for Thomas.

With this, Kamarul Hisham told reporters that the matter remains as status quo until the disposal of the suit. George was represented by Porres Royan.

Justice Asmabi also fixed May 13 for the hearing of the inter-parte injunction and also the Malaysian Bar's application to set-aside Shafee's ex-parte injunction.

The court also fixed April 14 for case management.

Long list of complaints

It was reported on March 13, a day before the Malaysian Bar annual general meeting that Shafee managed to get an ex-parte injunction (one party injunction) to stop the motion tabled by Thomas and supported by George from being discussed during the AGM.

Thomas and George had filed a motion for Shafee to be brought before the Bar's disciplinary board over the series of roadshows he led on Anwar's conviction which he helped secure.

They further cited Shafee's actions of holding press conferences criticising Anwar, who as a convicted prisoner cannot respond, as another reason why action should be taken against the Umno­linked lawyer.

Shafee's actions, they said, violated Rules 5(a), 31, 32, 33 and 49 of the Legal Profession (Practice and Etiquette) Rules 1978.

Rule 5(a) states that a lawyer should not accept a case if he or she cannot be a professional, while Rule 31 states lawyers should uphold the dignity of the profession.

Thomas ( right ) and George also cited Rule 33, which states that feelings between clients should not influence the lawyer's conduct towards parties), and Rule 49, which states that lawyers should not ask for a matter or case to be reported.

Shafee in his suit filed on March 12, a day before the AGM, claims Thomas had antagonism against him since he had represented Anwar in his bid to disqualify Shafee from representing the prosecution in the Sodomy II appeal.

The senior lawyer said he received a notice to attend the Malaysian Bar AGM on Feb 24. On Feb 28, the first and second defendant submitted the motion to the Bar Council secretary.

'Not a fit and proper person'

Shafee claimed the motion submitted was libelous to him and was an attempt to injure his reputation, his legal career and practise.

On March 9, Shafee claimed the Bar Council put up the motion on the Malaysian Bar website which could be accessed by all members and which contained the libelous words. On March 11, Shafee said he received the said agenda and motions of the AGM.

The Umno-linked lawyer claimed that the motion had untruthfully described his responsibility as an ad hoc deputy public prosecutor and also as a lawyer. He further alleged the motion was crude, scurrilous and highly inciteful.

Shafee further said the publication of the motions was calculated to draw malice and hatred towards him by way of his profession and career and was meant to represent that he was and unethical and dishonest lawyer with no integrity and honour.

It also represented that he was not independent, was politically-motivated and had acted as the ruling agent of Umno to secure Anwar's conviction and therefore he was not a fit and proper person to be a lawyer under the Legal Profession Act 1976 (LPA).

He further claimed the motion would invite the Malaysian Bar to usurp the powers and exclusive jurisdiction of the disciplinary board.

Shafee also claimed that if the motion was passed, it would violate the principles of natural justice for the plaintiff's right to a fair hearing.

He is seeking general damages, damages for libel, damages for tort of conspiracy and aggravated damages.

Similar to the last time, Shafee was not present at today's proceedings.