He said Umno had not done enough to inform the public that former prime minister Najib Razak suffered a miscarriage of justice for which he is entitled to a pardon.
He disputed party vice-president Johari Ghani’s call for the party to move on from the Pardons Board decision to reduce Najib’s sentence.
Zaid said the call to “move on” implied that there was no need to labour on Najib’s pardon any more. But he said Umno had not done anything worthwhile about the pardon.
“Sending a memorandum to the palace is not enough. Calling all the divisional leaders is not enough,” he wrote in a Facebook posting.
“The only basis for a pardon is that he did not get a fair trial and that there was a miscarriage of justice,” Zaid said.
Umno must press the case for fair trials. “Only then can we have wholesome justice in the country,” he wrote.
Zaid said Najib had suffered a miscarriage of justice because he was not represented by a lawyer in the final hearings of the SRC International case.
“Did Umno explain to the rakyat that the supreme courts of India, the US, and the High Court of Australia have decided that in all serious crimes, an accused must be represented and that their lawyers should be given enough time to prepare their defence?” he said.
Zaid also said there were elements of “prosecutorial misconduct” and irregularities during Najib’s trial in the SRC International case.
He said the prosecution in the Yayasan Akalbudi case cited the formation of a royal commission of inquiry when applying for a discharge not amounting to an acquittal for Umno president Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, who had been tried on 47 charges involving corruption, money laundering and abuse of power.
The royal commission was to look into allegations of selective prosecution following revelations contained in a controversial memoir by former attorney-general Tommy Thomas.
“Did Umno explain to the rakyat that, since Najib was charged during the same period under the same public prosecutor, in all probability, he too suffered from prosecutorial misconduct and therefore should be released?
“Where is this RCI? Did Umno press the government for the formation of the RCI? If Umno wants to help Najib, first they must be sincere. Sincerity coupled with the belief that an injustice was done to him.”
Zaid also said Umno must accept the fact that many Malaysians are opposed to a royal pardon for Najib and are already unhappy over the reduced jail sentence.
Nonetheless, he said Umno’s message must be on the importance of justice and a fair trial for an accused so that the rakyat could understand Najib’s plight better.
“If they had promised that everyone would be provided with a defence counsel (including the woman who stole cans of Milo), then the rakyat would understand the importance of legal representation.
“Umno promised to work towards separating the office of the attorney-general and public prosecutor. If they had done that, they would have been able to explain to the rakyat the dangers of politically-motivated prosecutions,” he said.
Zaid added that it would be easier to help mend the justice system while helping Najib when the rakyat better understands the issues.