High Court Grants Rosmah Conditional Stay Over RM67.5mil Jewellery Payment
KUALA LUMPUR: The High Court has granted Datin Seri Rosmah Mansor a conditional stay on a RM67.5mil payment she needed to make to Lebanese-based jeweller Global Royalty Trading SAL over 43 pieces of jewellery that were not returned to them.
Judicial Commissioner Marianne Antoinette Ghani, in her decision, ordered Rosmah to pay the judgment sum into a joint stakeholders account between solicitors for the parties within a month from today instead of paying directly to the plaintiff.
The JC said a conditional stay balances the rights of parties involved, ensuring that the plaintiff was assured of the fruits of its successful litigation while ensuring the defendant’s (Rosmah) rights of appeal not be rendered nugatory in the event her appeal was allowed.
“In the circumstances, the court orders that a conditional stay of execution be granted to the defendant pending her appeal to the Court of Appeal,” JC Marianne said here on Wednesday.
On June 10, the High Court ordered Rosmah to pay RM67,461,027.37 to the jeweller after the court found her to be liable for the missing pieces said to be within her custody.
The wife to former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak then filed a stay application on the judgment sum.
In her application, she said Global Royalty was a foreign entity with no presence or assets in Malaysia and was not listed in the First Schedule of the Reciprocal Enforcement of Judgments Act 1958 (REJA), hence there was a real risk that she would not recoup her money back if she succeeds in her appeal.
REJA is a Malaysian law that allows for the fast registration and enforcement of monetary judgments from superior courts in specific reciprocating countries, which Lebanon is not a part of.
Global Royalty filed the suit on May 29, 2023, claiming that Rosmah had falsely claimed that 44 pieces of jewellery, including diamond necklaces, bracelets and tiaras, sent to her by the company’s agent, were seized by Malaysian authorities under the Anti-Money Laundering, Anti-Terrorism Financing and Proceeds of Unlawful Activities Act 2001.
The jeweller said only one out of 44 pieces they owned was retained by the police.
They further claimed that Rosmah had shifted the blame to the Malaysian Government when the jewellery had in fact gone missing.
On June 10, High Court judge Justice Quay Chew Soon found that the 43 pieces of jewellery were delivered to Rosmah for viewing under a consignment arrangement and it remained the plaintiff’s property as Rosmah did not purchase the jewellery.
He said the legal consequences flowing therefrom became unavoidable, and the law imposed a burden upon Rosmah to properly account for the fate of the jewellery while under her custody.
Rosmah’s defence stated that the jewellery was moved from the official residence of the prime minister at Seri Perdana to the Pavilion unit and was subsequently seized by police during the raid on May 17, 2018.
The court then allowed the plaintiff’s claim against Rosmah and ordered her to pay RM67,461,027.37 to the plaintiff within one month, and RM75,000 in costs each to the plaintiff and the third parties.
Rosmah filed an appeal on June 12. The hearing of the appeal is pending.
The Star