JUDGMENT

Mohamed Dzaiddin CJ:

This is the judgment of the court.

This is an appeal against the decision of Augustine Paul J given on 25 April 2001 dismissing the appellants' motion for the writ of habeas corpus.

The appeal is founded on several grounds. However, before us on 15 October 2001, we heard arguments on the first ground, ie, the recusal application and adjourned our decision to today.

The facts leading to the above application are these. At the commencement of the hearing before the learned trial judge, En Sivarasa, one of the counsel for the appellants, urged him to consider whether he should recuse himself from hearing this case. Counsel's application was grounded on the fact that the learned judge was the judge who heard the case involving Dato' Seri Anwar bin Ibrahim, the conviction and sentence of which was handed dawn on 14 April 1999. This is the date that was referred to as "Black 14" in the press statement of the respondent. Counsel said that the conviction and sentence was the subject matter of strong public criticism including the Bar Council. He added that although there was no assertion of actual bias there might be a perception of bias as the facts are in th