Yameen's appeal points do not have sufficient basis: PG Office
If there is nothing more to be clarified, the next hearing will be the verdict hearing
Ex-President Yameen's appeal against verdict on pre-trial submissions, at the High Court
A hearing has been held in connection with an appeal made by Former President and opposition leader Abdulla Yameen regarding the court’s decision to reject the submissions made in connection with the R. Fuhgiri corruption case.
During the first hearing in connection with the case, Yameen presented three appeal points.
Thursday’s hearing saw the state prosecutors giving their response to the appeal points made by the defence.
One of the appeal points made by Yameen was regarding the lower court’s decision to not reject the evidence presented to the court by the state prosecutors, despite his request to reject them. The lower court ruled that there was no basis to reject the state-provided evidence.
In response to this, the state prosecutors argued that the appeal point did not have the basis to be considered an adequate appeal. To prove this point, the state had cited the Supreme Court’s case.
As such, referring to a high court ruling that the lower court had entered into the jurisdiction of judges to accept evidence in four circumstances, the state's prosecutor stated that no such reason had been given by Yameen.
Stressing that the defence had not given a sufficient reason to reject the state-provided evidence in the case, the state argued that Yameen had submitted inconsistent appeal points.
Yameen’s second appeal point was filed on the grounds that while the Evidence Act had a lot of scope leaning more towards the defence regarding accepting evidence in such cases, it was not allowed to make submissions on accepting evidence, under the new law.
In response to this, the state noted that the appeal point was in violation of the provisions of the courts act and that of the Code of Criminal Procedure to be followed.
This being said, the state prosecutors revealed that they do not see this point having a basis to be adequate for an appeal.
As a third appeal point, Yameen stated that Section 129 of the Criminal Procedure Code had been misinterpreted while reaching the verdict on the request to disclose the evidence.
The state prosecutor responded that the disclosure of the evidence obtained during investigation, was the practice followed by the state as legally mandated. They added that the state had presented documents regarding this matter as well. The state prosecutor also added that if there was a document that wasn’t used as evidence by the state, it may have not been produced before court.
The state also pointed out that not all documents prepared by the investigative authority during the probe would be made available to the Prosecutor General’s Office.
Following this, Yameen had responded to the state prosecutor’s response and the court had clarified some other points. Both sides were then given the chance to give a summary statement.
If there are no more clarifications to be made regarding the investigative stage, the verdict hearing will be scheduled next.
Justice Hassan Shafeeu is presiding over the case at the High Court. The judges bench comprises of Justice Mohamed Faisal and Justice Dheebanaz Fahmy.
