JUDGMENT

Abdul Rahman Sebli JCA:

[1] In the High Court at Kuala Lumpur, the appellants sued the respondent, Datuk Seri Mohd Najib Tun Haji Abdul Razak for the tort of misfeasance in public office and for "breach of fiduciaries in public office". The tort of misfeasance in public office was alleged to have been committed by the respondent in his capacities as the Prime Minister of Malaysia, Minister of Finance, President of the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) and Chairman of the Barisan Nasional (BN).

[2] It was alleged that in those capacities the respondent was in a position to control, command, instruct, require, to insist on any act, conduct, omissions, within the power of each and every machinery, including but not limited to the various Government Ministries and Parliamentary Offices or legal enforcement agencies or any other public figure or civil servant "to do certain things".

[3] The appellants' case was that the respondent had carried out acts to undermine, subvert and compromise the various institutions involved in the probe into 1Malaysia Development Berhad ("1MDB") and other related companies and the alleged remittance of approximately RM2.6 billion and RM42 million "or any other amount" into the respondent's personal bank accounts.

[4] Among the tortious acts allegedly committed by the respondent were the removals of Tan Sri Muhyiddin Hj Mohd Yassin from his post as Deputy Prime Minister, Dato' Seri Haji Mohd Shafie Haji Apdal from his post as Minister of Rural and Regional Development and Tan Sri Abdul Gani Patail from his post as Attorney-General.

[5] The respondent applied to strike out the suit pursuant to O 18 r 19 of the Rules of Court 2012 ("the Rules") on the ground that it was plainly and obviously unsustainable. The application was allowed by the learned judge, hence the present appeal before us, which we dismissed by a unanimous decision on the ground that the learned judge did not exercise his discretion wrongly in striking out the appellants' claims. These are the grounds of our decision.