PUTRAJAYA – Whether or not former Malaysian prime minister Najib Razak receives a royal pardon is now in the hands of the “court of compassion”, said minister Azalina Othman Said on Wednesday.

The Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department for Law and Institutional Reform said political party Umno, which both she and Najib belong to, no longer had a part to play as all legal avenues had been exhausted and that Malaysia’s King, Sultan Abdullah Ahmad Shah, has the final say.

“There is no other legal procedure left, only the court of compassion, meaning it’s at the discretion of the Yang di-Pertuan Agong (the King), and we cannot force it,” she told reporters after the launch on Wednesday of a public information website on disputes involving the so-called “Sulu heirs”, who claim to be the heirs to the defunct Sulu Sultanate.

Last Friday, Umno secretary-general Asyraf Wajdi Dusuki said the party was appealing to the King to consider granting Najib a royal pardon.

This followed the Umno supreme council’s decision earlier in April to ask the King to consider granting a royal pardon to Najib as per Article 42(1) of the Federal Constitution.

The request for a pardon drew significant criticism, with former minister in the Prime Minister’s Department for Parliament and law Wan Junaidi Jaafar claiming on Monday that Umno had no legal standing to submit the appeal on Najib’s behalf.

Najib, Malaysia’s sixth prime minister, has served eight months of a 12-year jail term for graft convictions in a case linked to state fund 1Malaysia Development Berhad, or 1MDB. THE STAR/ASIA NEWS NETWORK