Attorney-general Mohamed Apandi Ali defended his actions against accusations of being politically biased, saying he is his own man and fears no one but Allah.
"I don't listen to anybody, I don't follow anybody, I don't get anybody's instructions.
"I only follow the law. I fear nobody except Allah," Apandi told The Malaysian Insider (TMI) in an exclusive interview.
Apandi said this in defence of his independence when discussing the use of the Security Offences (Special Measures) Act (Sosma) against Umno grassroots leader Khairuddin Abu Hassan and his lawyer Matthias Chang, among other cases.
Critics, including former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad, have said the charge was politically motivated , as Khairuddin and Chang had lodged police reports against 1MDB overseas.
However, Apandi insisted that his actions came because the duo had threatened Malaysia's banking and financial services sector.
"Khairuddin and Matthias Chang, to me, I don't see them as critics of the government, but I see them as offenders, as per the law," he said.
'I don't listen to anybody'
The duo were charged after Khairuddin lodged a series of police reports locally and abroad against Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak’s embattled pet project 1MDB.
Apandi, who replaced Abdul Gani Patail at the height of a task force investigating 1MDB’s scandals, held up his track record when he was a deputy public prosecutor and a judge to prove how independent he was.
"I don't listen to anybody. I have sent people to the gallows, I've also acquitted them. I've convicted policemen," the AG told TMI.
Apandi then cited his judgment in the Altantuya Shaariibuu case, in which he, as an appellate judge, acquitted former police commandos Sirul Azhar Umar and Azilah Hadri of the murder.
The duo were then re-convicted by the Federal Court and sentenced to death.
Sirul has since fled the country and is now being held at an immigration detention centre in Australia.
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