Nizamuddin Hamid, acting for Azmin, said that the claim by lawyer Yohendra Nadarajan that the papers were served on his client is “completely untrue and inherently misleading.”
“The suit was served on a person at Azmin’s service centre. As such, it is bad service and in blatant contravention of the rules of court,” he said in a statement.
Nizamuddin said a writ of summons must be served according to procedures set out in the rules of court.
“This is common practice, and we are shocked that he (Yohendra) saw fit to announce that the papers had been served upon Azmin on Dec 1,” he added.
He was responding to reports on Monday which quoted Yohendra as saying that no lawyers for Azmin appeared in court during case management in the suit.
Nizamuddin said there had been no effort to personally serve the papers on Azmin at his home or office at the international trade and industry ministry.
He said Yohendra did not write to Azmin to seek an appointment to effect service.
“Azmin respects the judicial system and in the event the plaintiffs had served the suit by the applicable procedures provided under law, he would have appeared promptly,” he added.
Yohendra said High Court deputy registrar Maslinda Selamat had asked him to file an affidavit of service to show proof that the legal papers had been served on Azmin.
Maslinda has fixed Jan 14 for another case management.
The voters want a declaration that Azmin, as trustee, owes them a fiduciary duty as an elected representative.
They also want a declaration that Azmin committed the tort of deceit against them and had violated his constitutional oath under Article 59(1), read together with the 6th Schedule of the Federal Constitution.
In their statement of claim filed last month , the plaintiffs contend that Azmin made a representation that he was standing for election in 2018 to oust the then Barisan Nasional coalition and to free Malaysia of corrupt officials.
They said Azmin caused the collapse of the Pakatan Harapan government in February by joining the Perikatan Nasional administration, which included BN and persons Azmin himself had acknowledged were “credibly accused of corrupt practices”.
They added that Azmin, the former PKR deputy president, had pledged to abide by the PH 2018 election manifesto to address, among others, the wrongdoings of BN when it formed the federal government.