KUALA LUMPUR — Malaysia's King, Sultan Ibrahim, warned on Saturday that any attempt to challenge his order allowing former Prime Minister Najib Razak to move from jail to house arrest could amount to defying his decree, a day after authorities delayed Najib's transfer, Reuters reported.

Source: Reuters via SRN News

The warning came in a statement issued by the national palace, Istana Negara. Sultan Ibrahim said his pardon order was “clear, explicit and without any ambiguity” and that there should be no confusion over its interpretation and no prolonged uncertainty over implementing a decision that has been granted, the palace statement said.

Source: Scoop (Malaysia)

The king's intervention follows the Attorney-General's Chambers move on Friday to suspend Najib's house-arrest transfer hours after a court had cleared it, saying legal questions about the pardon needed clarification first. Read: Attorney-General suspends Najib's house-arrest transfer

Najib, 73, has been in Kajang Prison since 2022 after being found guilty of corruption and money laundering in a case linked to the multibillion-dollar scandal at state fund 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB). He has consistently denied wrongdoing. He had been due to be transferred home on Friday after his party, UMNO, paid a 50-million-ringgit fine — about $12 million, yaani roughly 5 crore ringgit — which was a condition of the conditional royal pardon issued by the king in September.

Source: Reuters via SRN News

RM50 millionFine paid by UMNO (about $12 million)
September 18Date of the king's conditional pardon order
August 23, 2028End of the sentence covered by the house-arrest order
15 yearsAdditional sentence in a second 1MDB case, to begin afterwards

The palace said the power of pardon is a royal prerogative under Article 42 of Malaysia's Federal Constitution and must be respected in accordance with the constitutional monarchy and the rule of law. Given that all conditions in the pardon order had been fulfilled, the palace said, any argument questioning the order would amount to moving towards defying the king's decree, Malaysian outlet Scoop reported.

Source: Scoop (Malaysia)

Najib's lawyers thanked the monarch on Saturday and said there was no basis for authorities to keep Najib in prison “a moment longer”. “They must transfer him immediately to his residence at Jalan Langgak Duta to serve his house arrest, as His Majesty has ordered,” lawyer Farhan Shafee said in a statement.

Source: AsiaToday

The house-arrest order applies only to Najib's first conviction. He faces an additional 15 years in prison after being found guilty last year in another 1MDB-linked case, with that sentence set to begin after his house-arrest stint ends. As of Saturday, the Attorney-General's Chambers had not provided a timeline for resolving the legal questions it raised, leaving the transfer in limbo.

What happens next turns on whether the Attorney-General's Chambers accepts the palace's reading of the pardon or continues to seek clarification through the courts — a standoff that has put the monarchy's pardoning power and the government's legal machinery in open tension over one of Malaysia's most divisive political figures.