The appeal was originally fixed for hearing today.

Lawyer Siti Sarah Khalil, a member of Isa’s legal team, said they had requested a postponement of the hearing after receiving the prosecution’s written submissions on Feb 20.

“The submissions are about 500 pages long and we need time to study it,” she told FMT.

Deputy public prosecutor Afzainizam Abdul Aziz said the prosecution had no objection to the adjournment.

Court of Appeal deputy registrar Noor Firdaus fixed the new hearing date during a case management today.

Afzainizam said parties have been directed to file their submissions in reply two weeks before the hearing.

Isa is challenging trial judge Nazlan Ghazali’s 400-page written judgment released in August 2021, claiming that it contained multiple errors of law and fact.

Nazlan, now a Court of Appeal judge, had sentenced Isa to six years’ jail and fined him RM15.4 million on Feb 3, 2021 after finding him guilty on nine counts of corruption involving RM3.09 million in connection with Felda’s purchase of a hotel in Kuching in 2014.

He sentenced Isa to six years’ jail on each of the nine counts, with the sentences to run concurrently.

Nazlan, however, granted Isa a stay of execution against the prison sentence and fine pending his appeal to the Court of Appeal.

Isa, who was the Felda chairman from January 2011 to January 2017, was freed on bail of RM1.5 million.

He was slapped with one charge of criminal breach of trust (CBT) and nine counts of corruption over the purchase of the Merdeka Palace Hotel and Suites in Kuching, Sarawak.

At the close of the prosecution’s case, the court acquitted him of the CBT charge but ordered him to enter his defence on the corruption charges.

The prosecution is appealing Isa’s acquittal on the CBT charge.