The Malaysian Bar’s 74th Annual General Meeting (AGM) managed to elect office bearers for 2020/2021 despite a low member turnout, following fears over Covid-19 infection.
The AGM was supposed to start at 10am but had to be postponed to 12.15pm even though the necessary quorum of 500 was not met, when only 87 out of 20,000 of Bar Council members turned up. The meeting ended at around 1.30pm.
Malaysian Bar Council’s secretary Salim Bashir was elected as the legal body’s new president.
At a press conference later, Salim said he hoped his election would not be disputed by members from the legal body.
“Under the Legal Profession Act, we do not think there is a problem,” he said.
Apart from Salim, the other three Malaysian Bar committee members elected by the 38 new council members were vice-president Surinder Singh, secretary AG Kalidas, and treasurer Mohamad Ezri Abdul Wahab.
Salim said 12 motions proposed at the AGM were also withdrawn. They would be tabled in the near future.
Among the motions were banning child marriages, preventing political party-hopping, unresolved deaths and disappearance cases.
Salim said the council members would decide when an extraordinary general meeting would be held in future after the Covid-19 situation improves and for the motions to be tabled.