Session 8: Execution of Court Orders and Judgment

Presented By: The Rt. Hon. YAA Tan Sri Richard Malanjum

Chief Judge of Sabah & Sarawak

Year 2009

Year 2010

Year 2011

Year 2012

Statistics of environmental cases in Malaysia

Registration Disposed of Pending

952 865 379

Registration Disposed of Pending

1101 1112 368

Registration Disposed of Pending

638 797 209

Registration Disposed of Pending

398 430 177

Constraints on the courts◦Highest sentence – 6 months◦Highest fines- RM250,000.00◦The legislations providing for lenient penalties

◦Absence of restitutions against offenders

◦Large corporations merely asked junior officers to appear for them thus the responsible officers escaped

Challenges inensuring a judgment or order is

executed

In civil cases more often than not damage irreversible by the time actions are heard◦Forest destroyed ◦Dams completed and impounded

Underhand tactics by big corporations ◦Use of thugs

Challenges inensuring a judgment or order is

executed

Pending legal action

Unsafe water from the source due to deforestation

Destruction of forest of the water catchment area due illegal logging

The Murum Dam

The Murum Dam protest

The Murum Dam Court case

The cultural characteristic of the Malaysian people is another factor that cannot be ignored as it assumes a crucial role in the way environmental rules and regulations are being enforced.

Malaysians are known to suppress their inner feelings in order to avoid criticism, conflict, disagreement and controversy in conducting all interpersonal relations in a smooth and unthreatening manner.

The Southeast Asian style of dealing with unpleasant or

dangerous situations is avoidance and silence, repressing emotions with the hope that the problem will disappear if matters are smoothed over.

Malaysians failed to realise that environmental protection is not a matter exclusively to be dealt with by the government, but a matter that requires full social participation to ensure successful results.

Characteristic of Civil Society

Thank You

Execution of Court Orders and Judgment