Focus on restoring the credibility of the judiciary, and not on lawyers or whistleblowers this was the message which the Malaysian Bar wished to convey to Minister in the Prime Minister's Department Mohamed Nazri Abdul Aziz today.

Responding to Nazri's remark in a recent Malaysiakini interview labelling lawyers as "crazy", Malaysian Bar president Ambiga Sreenevasan said the government should heed the calls made by the lawyers to make the judiciary stronger and first class.

On Friday, Nazri branded the lawyers as "crazy" for taking their dissatisfaction over the state of the judiciary to the government in a march dubbed as the 'Walk for Justice' two weeks ago.

"They're all crazy lawyers - (to) go to the streets to ask the executive to interfere," the de facto law minister said in an hour-long interview.

Responding today, Ambiga said the walk for justice involving more that 2,000 lawyers cutting across age, gender, racial line and seniority showed that they strongly considered this as a serious issue of the judiciary.

"What is important is the message put forward during our march," Bernama quoted Ambiga as saying.

"I do not wish to quarrel with the minister since I have a good working relationship with him but on this issue I intend to disagree with him because earlier he had also stated that the Malaysian Bar was acting like an opposition party," Ambiga said.

"The judiciary issue has been there for a long time and the march was just not about the video clip," she added.

First-class judiciary

Ambiga said the walk was an attempt to highlight much bigger issues pertaining to the importance of strengthening the judiciary.

"We want a strong and first-class judiciary which we are capable of having," she said in the Bernama report.

She added that "we are entitled to have an institution that is scandal-free" and that there are many honest and hardworking judges.

She also said that it would be wrong to ignore the views expressed by those who participated in the march which received a lot of support from the public.

"We at the Malaysian Bar strongly feel that a royal commission must be set up, similar to what the government did for the police force. Our only motive is a strong judiciary, what is wrong with that?" she added.

The unprecedented 3.5km march - from the Palace of Justice to the PM's office in Putrajaya - was prompted by the revelation of an eight-minute video clip showing senior lawyer VK Lingam talking on the phone purportedly with Chief Justice Ahmad Fairuz Sheikh Abdul Halim.

Ahmad Fairuz, who was then chief judge of Malaya when the clip was said to be recorded in 2002, has since denied his involvement through Nazri, while Lingam has kept mum on the scandal.


SPECIAL REPORT: The Lingam tape