Lawyer Muhammad Rafique Rashid Ali said they preferred instead to concentrate on clients who were willing to pay legal fees for services rendered.
“The poor and needy are denied access to justice when lawyers registered under the scheme refuse to take up cases,” he told FMT in response to the fate of the five-year National Legal Aid Foundation (YBGK).
Rafique said prior to August last year, lawyers received their payments within a month after filing their claims.
“Now it takes between three and five months,” said the lawyer who is also a member of the Selangor Bar Committee.
Rafique said the scheme was a good training ground in criminal law practice for young lawyers as they could represent clients during remand, bail applications, trials and appeals.
“These lawyers come in handy to represent poor and needy clients who otherwise have to pay hefty legal fees to engage counsel.
“If not for the scheme, the poor will not have access to justice when they are unrepresented in court,” he added.
He said there could be no equal justice where only those with money had access to a trial.
“The setting up of the YBGK is applauded but it has come to a near standstill due to the apparent lack of allocation,” he said.
The lawyer said the management and objectives of YBGK needed a relook and that the input of the judiciary, police, civil society, prisons and welfare departments must also be considered.
Attorney-General Mohamed Apandi Ali, who is also the YBGK chairman, last September ordered his officials to prepare a report following claims that the legal aid scheme was on the verge of collapse.
The AG, who also doubles up as public prosecutor, said no accused person from a poor financial background should be denied a trial.
Selangor Bar Committee chairman Salim Bashir had then said close to RM822,000 had yet to be settled, while his Negeri Sembilan counterpart Joseph Mathews said the amount owing to lawyers there was RM106,000.
FMT understands that the total amount owed to lawyers in the peninsula between January and August last year is about RM3.4 million.
Salim had said the state legal aid committee had to literally beg its members to represent suspects and accused persons.
Bar Council chairman Steven Thiru , who spoke at the opening of the legal year early this month, also expressed concern that the scheme could suffer in view of the present economic climate.
“This should not happen, because a state-funded legal aid programme is no less important than a state-funded public health scheme,” he said.
The scheme is a joint enterprise between the government and the three Bars of Malaysia – the Malaysian Bar, Sabah Law Association and the Advocates’ Association of Sarawak.
Between April 2012 and December last year, YBGK lawyers handled 551,152 cases.