A view of the residence of former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak at Jalan Langgak Duta, Taman Duta November 6, 2026. — Picture by Choo Choy May
Summary
Najib Razak's lawyers challenge the Attorney General's temporary suspension of his house arrest, arguing it contradicts the King's decree issued today.
The legal team insists the King's order should be immediately executed, citing the High Court's decision that payment of a fine discharges liability.
They assert the royal pardon is the King's prerogative and not subject to legal review, urging Najib's transfer to his residence.
First Published: Saturday, 07 Nov 2026 8:03 PM MYT
KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 7 — Lawyers for Datuk Seri Najib Razak are contesting the Attorney General’s Chambers’ (AGC) decision to temporarily suspend his house arrest, demanding the former prime minister be transferred to his home immediately.
In a media statement today, the legal firm Messrs Shafee & Co. argued that the AGC’s “temporary suspension” of the house arrest order contradicts the King’s explicit decree issued this morning.
“His Majesty has now spoken. The AGC can honour that commitment in only one way: by allowing the Titah (decree) to be carried out today,” the statement read.
The legal team argued that the High Court’s “Order of Discharge on Payment of Fine” issued on November 6 cannot be used to extend Najib’s imprisonment, citing the order’s own recital that the fine has been paid.
“In law, payment of a fine discharges the liability to pay that fine. It cannot, by itself, bring a sentence of imprisonment to an end,” the statement said.
They further asserted that the Pardon is an exercise of the King’s prerogative under Article 42 of the Federal Constitution and is not subject to review by any court or the Attorney General.
The statement noted that the AGC issued a subsequent media statement 57 minutes after the King’s decree, which did not reference the royal order.
According to the legal team, Najib remains in Kajang Prison as of the statement’s issuance, with no effect yet given to the King’s decree.
They have requested the Commissioner General of Prisons to transfer Najib to his residence at No. 11, Jalan Langgak Duta, Taman Duta, Kuala Lumpur.
“His Majesty’s order must be carried out today,” the statement read.
IT is puzzling to learn that the armed forces has decided to stop the sale of duty-free beer at outlets operated by its trading arm, Perbadanan Perwira Niaga Malaysia (PERNAMA), ending a practice that has been in place for more than six decades.
According to media reports, a manager at a PERNAMA outlet, speaking on condition of anonymity, said operators had recently received a directive from the office of the armed forces chief instructing them to cease sales once existing stocks were exhausted.
No reason was given for the decision.
The manager said PERNAMA, which operates about 80 outlets nationwide, had also been instructed not to place fresh orders, which are typically made every six months.
Under current regulations, non-Muslim servicemen and veterans may purchase up to two crates of beer monthly from PERNAMA, with each crate containing 48 cans or bottles.
An ex-serviceman, who also requested anonymity, said beer purchased from PERNAMA was typically about 60% cheaper than at regular retail outlets.
PERNAMA is wholly owned by the Armed Forces Fund Board, a statutory body under the Defence Ministry.
While the decision to stop beer sales has been made, one wonders what prompted the move to end a practice that has continued for more than six decades.
Have there been recent problems associated with the sale of beer that led to this decision? Was it influenced by religious considerations or an attempt to appease certain conservative groups?
Was the decision made through consensus, taking into consideration the rights of all Malaysians under the Federal Constitution?
Veterans have publicly called on the Defence Ministry to provide a clear explanation for the abrupt policy shift. A key point of contention is that the directive was reportedly issued without an official explanation, leaving affected individuals feeling sidelined.
The armed forces comprises people from different ethnic and religious communities, and their diversity should be respected. Decisions affecting them should therefore be made through consultation and consensus.
One of the major weaknesses in addressing alcohol-related issues in the country is the tendency to reduce the discussion to a simplistic divide between Muslims and non-Muslims.
Excessive alcohol consumption is a matter of public concern, with social and cultural implications in a diverse society.
Alcohol consumption among some non-Muslim communities is associated with celebrations, weddings, social gatherings and business activities. These cultural practices should not automatically be dismissed as social ills.
The Muslim community’s position on alcohol consumption is clear, as it is prohibited in Islam. Non-Muslims, meanwhile, have long understood the policies, regulations and laws governing alcohol distribution and consumption in the country.
They are also concerned about the harmful effects of excessive and unregulated alcohol consumption.
Issues of this nature should therefore be handled transparently through dialogue and consensus. This is essential to building a shared understanding of the implications of alcohol abuse in a multiracial and multireligious society.
While approaches to addressing alcohol-related social problems may differ between Muslim and non-Muslim communities, there is a general understanding that issues such as drink-driving and alcohol abuse are harmful and can affect family well-being, public safety and social harmony.
What is needed is dialogue between Muslims and non-Muslims on the dangers of alcohol abuse and how its distribution and consumption can be regulated without undermining the rights of non-Muslims to consume alcohol in moderation, including in accordance with their cultural practices.
Such dialogue, particularly in an interfaith setting, would encourage problem-solving instead of polemics. It would also help communities understand one another’s rights and concerns without allowing any group to dominate issues that require a common understanding.
The Association for Welfare, Community and Dialogue (ACID) therefore urges the authorities to find common ground on the issue of alcohol and avoid reducing it purely to a religious matter.
The rationale behind decisions affecting established practices should also be clearly explained.
Dialogue and consensus are progressive ways of addressing alcohol consumption and distribution in public spaces without creating unnecessary divisions between Muslims and non-Muslims. ‒ Nov 6, 2026
Ronald Benjamin is a human resources practitioner based in Ipoh. He is currently secretary of the Association for Community and Dialogue.
As a vanguard of religious leadership, the PAS supremo has single-handedly elevated local political discourse into an apocalyptic battleground.
From Moaz Nair
We must all extend our heartfelt gratitude to PAS president Abdul Hadi Awang. For decades, ordinary Malaysians have blundered through political disagreements using tedious, secular terms like “policy differences”, “economic discrepancies” or “constitutional debates”. How utterly pedestrian.
As a vanguard of religious leadership, the PAS supremo has single-handedly elevated local political discourse into an apocalyptic battleground. While political analysts and opposition figures may fret over his “highly polarising language”, they simply lack the vision to appreciate the sheer artistry of his negative vocabulary. For those trying to understand how a man so deeply versed in Islam chooses to navigate the political arena, here is a handy guide to his masterclass in decorum.
‘Dajjal’ doctrine
Why debate the terms of a standard legislative agreement when you can invoke the literal embodiment of evil? In November, when the government and opposition floated a routine confidence and supply agreement, ordinary leaders might have debated fiscal allocations. Not the maestro. Hadi swiftly diagnosed the cross-party truce as a “Dajjal approach at the end of times”. By equating a political compromise to the false Messiah, he reminded us all that bipartisanship isn’t just bad governance – it is practically the precursor to Armageddon.
Advanced sociology
In 2022, Hadi gracefully simplified the complex, systemic issue of financial crime. While anti-corruption agencies waste millions studying institutional loopholes, Hadi cracked the code by declaring non-Muslims and non-Bumiputeras the “roots of corruption” in Malaysia. When civil society groups like Transparency International Malaysia cried foul over xenophobia, they clearly missed the theological nuance: why fix a broken system when you can just blame a demographic?
Grammar lessons
Parliamentary decorum is so last century. In 2025, during a serious parliamentary debate, Hadi decided to give the Dewan Rakyat a live lesson in the finer points of the national language. When referring to a small group of white Westerners, he bypassed standard human pronouns entirely and opted for the animal classifier “ekor” (tails). While lawmakers questioned his basic courtesy, language purists had to admire his commitment to treating geopolitical adversaries like stray livestock.
Intellectual plebeians
Consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds. When four Malay DAP leaders had the audacity to question Hadi’s shifting ideological stances over the years, he didn’t bother wasting precious scripture on them. Instead, he publicly dismissed them as “kurang berpendidikan” (uneducated). It is a flawless debate tactic: if someone points out an inconsistency, simply remind them they lack the spiritual PhD required to comprehend it.
Friendship flexibility
Over the decades, the PAS supremo has treated political alliances like fashion seasons – highly disposable and entirely dependent on the weather. Consider his decades-long dance with DAP. During the golden years of the Barisan Alternatif and Pakatan Rakyat coalitions (1999–2013), Hadi shared the stage with the very same DAP leaders he now rebukes. Back then, political cooperation (tahaluf siyasi) was championed as a noble, strategic pursuit.
Fast forward to the 2015 PAS muktamar, where the party abruptly severed ties with DAP without debate. Overnight, the former allies were retroactively transformed into the ultimate ideological adversaries. Progressive PAS members who dared to question this sudden U-turn were thoroughly purged, eventually leaving to form the splinter party Amanah.
The flexibility didn’t stop there. By 2019, Hadi had signed the Muafakat Nasional pact with Umno – the absolute arch-nemesis his infamous 1981 “Amanat Hadi” had once forcefully condemned. By 2020, he pivoted again to anchor Perikatan Nasional. It is a masterclass in situational theology: an alliance is perfectly holy right up until the exact moment it becomes politically inconvenient, at which point it is scrubbed from historical memory.
Political safari
When he is not channelling the end-times, our grand maestro moonlights as a visionary political safari guide, earning the fond moniker of an “amateur zoologist”. Under his taxonomic eye, a battered Umno was famously diagnosed as a hobbled “itik patah kaki” (lame duck) to justify PAS seizing the steering wheel.
Meanwhile, secular opportunists and those demanding Western-style updates are swiftly demoted to “binatang yang tidak berakal” (senseless animals). Should you dare criticise his shifting paradigms, you are seamlessly categorised into his menagerie as either a hyperactive “kera” (monkey), a relentlessly barking “anjing” (dog) or a “babi” (pig). Naturally, this rich pedagogical blueprint has inspired his disciples – PAS lawmakers recently took flight into the aviary, branding Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim a “burung tiong” (myna bird) to mock him as a mindless echo chamber for external policies.
Linguistic irony
This leads us to the ultimate comedic paradox of modern Malaysian politics: the profound irony of utilising the sacred vocabulary of the heavens to conduct everyday, transactional mud-slinging. Islam possesses a rich linguistic tradition designed to inspire spiritual contemplation and universal grace. Yet, in the hands of the PAS leadership, this vocabulary is weaponised as a highly specialised political toolkit.
When routine legislative agreements are framed through the lens of Islamic eschatology, a standard, secular agreement is artificially inflated into a cosmic battle between divine light and ultimate darkness. By deploying heavy theological concepts to score cheap points in the daily 24-hour news cycle, the sacred is systematically cheapened.
The greatest irony lies in the moral inversion it creates. While the faith heavily emphasises humility, restraint and the avoidance of slander, this brand of political rhetoric uses the language of the faith to justify the exact opposite: alienating minor demographics, dismissing critics as intellectually inferior and reducing foreign visitors to animal classifiers.
Entertaining spectacle
While monitoring bodies like the Centre for Independent Journalism track his vocabulary as a major driver of identity-based division, defenders stand firm, arguing this uncompromising tone is a steadfast defence of faith.
And who can blame them? Nothing screams “peaceful, universal faith” quite like reducing your neighbours to corrupt roots, your parliamentary colleagues to animals and basic governance to the work of the false Messiah.
Ultimately, this strategy yields a highly entertaining spectacle. By insisting that every standard political manoeuvre is either an act of divine necessity or a plot by the Dajjal, the political arena becomes an absurdist theatre – proving that nothing elevates a secular turf war quite like a heavy dusting of fire and brimstone.
Former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak is pictured at the Kuala Lumpur High Court Complex on August 27, 2026. — Picture by Firdaus Latif
Summary
Attorney General Tan Sri Mohd Dusuki Mokhtar has sought an audience with the King to discuss former Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak's house arrest in his SRC International case, according to Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim.
Anwar emphasized that while the Agong's power to grant pardons remains undisputed, legal clarification is needed regarding Najib's involvement in the 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) case.
The Prime Minister noted that deliberations with the judiciary might be necessary, as this matter falls outside his jurisdiction.
The Attorney General is expected to elaborate further on this issue.
First Published: Saturday, 07 Nov 2026 5:27 PM MYT
SHAH ALAM, Nov 7 — Attorney General Tan Sri Mohd Dusuki Mokhtar has requested an audience with His Majesty, Sultan Ibrahim, to discuss former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s house arrest in his SRC International case, Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim said today.
Anwar stressed that the Agong’s power to grant pardons was not being disputed, but said there was a legal issue involving Najib’s 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) case that required clarification by the courts.
“I have asked for the Attorney General to immediately meet the Agong to ‘mohon ampun’ and explain why that decision was accepted for the SRC case, but there is a problem as it involves the second case, which is the 1MDB case.
“So to explain and maybe we need a few days to decide after referring to the judiciary. I also only leave it to the Attorney General to elaborate on this case, because this is not the prime minister’s jurisdiction,” he told reporters after launching the National Family Month celebrations at the Selangor International Trade Centre (SITC) here.
Anwar later added that the AG had already requested an audience with the King to explain the house arrest issue.
Nooryana Najwa Najib questions why the RM50 million fine was accepted if there were obstacles to implementing the conditional pardon granted to her father.
Najib Razak’s daughter, Nooryana Najwa, said the family was merely seeking justice and that the conditional pardon for her father should be respected. (Bernama pic)
PETALING JAYA: Najib Razak’s daughter, Nooryana Najwa, has expressed disappointment over the delay in implementing her father’s house arrest following the payment of the RM50 million fine in fulfillment of the conditional pardon order.
“As a daughter, I am deeply disappointed. We have complied with everything stipulated in the conditional pardon order. We raised the funds, paid the RM50 million fine and followed the prescribed procedures.
“If there were additional conditions, why were we not informed from the outset? And if there were still obstacles, why was the RM50 million payment accepted (yesterday)?” she said in an Instagram reel.
Nooryana said the episode is a bitter reminder of the experience the family faced with the royal addendum.
She was referring to the house arrest order, which was said to have been issued in 2024, following the original pardon order which halved Najib’s prison term from 12 years to six and reduced his fine from RM210 million to RM50 million.
“There has been so much back and forth, uncertainty and delay after delay.
“Every time we feel that our father is getting closer to coming home, another obstacle emerges. How long must this go on? We are merely seeking justice. We want the royal order to be respected and the rule of law upheld,” she said.
Nooryana was commenting on the Attorney-General’s Chambers’ (AGC) suggestion yesterday that her father’s house arrest be deferred until a review of the conditional pardon and Order of Discharge is conducted.
The AGC said these two issues involved “complex legal questions” that had implications for the execution of the royal pardon and a court order.
A statement from Istana Negara today, however, said that the Yang di-Pertuan Agong, Sultan Ibrahim, emphasised that the conditional pardon order is clear, explicit and unambiguous, and is not related to any other cases involving the former prime minister.
The palace also said there should be no room for confusion in the interpretation of the order, nor should there be prolonged uncertainty over the implementation of the decision that has been consented to.
“Given that all the conditions stipulated in the conditional pardon order have been fulfilled, any arguments challenging the order would amount to defying the decree of His Majesty the Yang di-Pertuan Agong,” the palace said.
