KUALA LUMPUR (April 16): Former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak's appeal to recuse judge Datuk Collin Lawrence Sequerah in the 1Malaysia Development Bhd-Tanore (1MDB-Tanore) trial will be heard in August.

The appellate court has set Aug 20 to hear the matter following a case management on Tuesday. Deputy public prosecutor Mohamad Mustafa P Kunyalam confirmed the matter with The Edge when contacted.

Najib's appeal revolves around the judge's disclosure last year that he and former 1MDB general counsel Jasmine Loo Ai Swan were once partners at law firm Messrs Zain & Co over a decade ago.

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Sequerah, who is now a Court of Appeal (COA) judge, made the disclosure following Loo's return to Malaysia in July last year after absconding for about six years since April 2018. Sequerah was already a partner in Zain & Co when Loo was elevated to partnership at the firm in 2004.

Najib then filed an application to recuse Sequerah. The judge heard lengthy submissions on the matter and later dismissed the application on the grounds that the legal test was that there was a real danger of bias, which the former Pekan MP failed to prove.

Sequerah also said that he had not had any communications with Loo - either personally or professionally - since she left the firm in 2008.

Loo has since testified in the ongoing trial where she echoed the same. The prosecution's 50th witness wrapped up her testimony earlier this month and has been released from the stand.

The 50-year-old, often described as an associate of the fugitive Low Taek Jho (Jho Low), is expected to be the prosecution's last witness in the six-year-long trial.

There are still a handful of witnesses - including former central bank governor Tan Sri Zeti Akhtar Aziz - to be crossed and re-examined before the prosecution wraps up its case and a decision is delivered on whether the former PM will be acquitted or called to enter his defence.

The trial is set to continue on April 22 and for the first time spill into Saturday on April 27.

Najib faces four counts of abuse of power for using his position as then prime minister, finance minister and chairman of 1MDB’s board of advisers to receive gratifications worth RM2.27 billion. He also faces 21 money laundering charges. 

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