The Latest News From Yahya Waloni, Admits Not Knowing And Retracts Pretrial

Sole Judge of the South Jakarta District Court Anry Widyo Laksono (right) shows a letter requesting the revocation of pretrial on behalf of Yahya Waloni to the representative of lawyer Abdullah Al Katir/Antara

JAKARTA - The Sole Judge of the South Jakarta District Court, Anry Widyo Laksono, read out a letter requesting the revocation of a pretrial made by Muhammad Yahya Waloni at the first pretrial hearing, in Jakarta, Monday, September 20.

The judge at the trial asked for clarification from the team of lawyers who represented themselves as Yahya Waloni's attorneys regarding the letter of revocation of the application.

"Here is a letter signed by him. The point is to withdraw the pretrial application. We as judges only examine the pretrial, and are not involved in the relationship between the principal (applicant, ed.) and the attorney," said Judge Anry as quoted by Antara.

Yahya Waloni in a letter dated September 13, 2021 asked the Chairman of the South Jakarta District Court to withdraw the application for pretrial No. 85/Pid.Pre/2021/PN JKT.SEL.

Yahya Waloni, a suspect in the blasphemy case, explained that he was not aware of the pretrial application. Yahya, through his letter, said that the power of attorney to his attorney Abdullah Al Katiri had been revoked.

"The pretrial application was registered by my former attorney on September 7, I have revoked my power of attorney since September 6, 2021. The letter of revocation of power is attached," said Judge Anry reading Yahya Waloni's letter.

"As for the pretrial application, I was never notified. I just found out (pretrial application) September 8th from my family. I strongly object to the pretrial application submitted by a former attorney on my behalf,” said Yahya.

In this regard, the judge gave time for legal counsel to contact Yahya and confirm the validity of the revocation letter.

"Because we consider it necessary to fulfill the legal standing, we ask this lawyer to directly (contact via) Zoom with the person concerned," said Anry.

The Coordinator of the Lawyers Team representing a total of 30 legal advisers from the Indonesian Muslim Advocates Association, Abdullah Al Katiri, objected to the contents of the letter and the direction of the judge.

Abdullah said that Yahya Waloni had revoked the power of attorney for assistance, not the pretrial power of attorney.

Regarding the clarification, Abdullah said that the legal advisory team had difficulty contacting Yahya since he was detained at the National Police Criminal Investigation Unit.

“Since he was arrested, we have never been facilitated to meet. We never met or communicated with him. We are concerned about the suspicion of pressures. We asked him to be presented offline (directly, ed.)," Abdullah said.

The judge accepted Abdullah's explanation regarding the revocation of the accompanying power of attorney. He then suspended the pretrial hearing for one hour to rest and contacted the Criminal Investigation Unit of the National Police.