COMMENT | Five and a half years after the United States Department of Justice filed its largest-ever criminal complaint relating to the embezzling of 1MDB, a government-linked company, the Court of Appeal today unanimously upheld High Court judge Mohd Nazlan Mohd Ghazali’s earlier conviction of former prime minister Najib Abdul Razak.

He fined Najib RM210 million and sentenced him to 12 years in jail. Ghazali, however, let Najib out on bail to await his appeal.

Najib should not have been granted this privilege considering the scale of his crime and his subsequent behaviour. That the Court of Appeal judges had to admonish his high-priced lawyers and Najib not to treat the courts as kedai kopi (coffee shop) was instructive.

Now the Court of Appeal is repeating the same mistake made by judge Ghazali by allowing Najib a stay of execution. He should have been stripped of his expensive Armani suits, put in orange prison garb, have his mug shot taken, and be driven straight to prison.

That smug, silly grin must be wiped off his face to serve as a much-needed antidote for us Malays, especially those in Umno...