Brothers in dispute over small sum of money in bank account of late father

 first drafted Mon 1st Feb 2016

PENAMPANG. The native court here told two brothers they should always try to avoid unnecessary disputes amongst family members especially when involving small amount of money. Such cases should not even reach the Native Court, said District Chief Bryan Matasing who was hearing the case together with Native Chiefs Andrew S Lidaun and  Woritus Paulus.
 
The elder brother had filed a complaint claiming that his brother had prepared a statutory declaration which did not include his name amongst the sibling. He claimed the defendant had gone to see an Assistant District Officer (ADO) at Penampang who did not sign the document because his name was not listed. The younger brother then went to see a Justice of Peace at Kota Kinabalu and got the same document signed and stamped. The purpose was to claim the bank account and some shares of their late father who passed last year.
The plaintiff also claimed that the defendant also attached the Last Will (wasiat) of their father and question whether the Will is genuine since as far as he knows Wills are kept by a lawyer or the owner of the Will himself and only announced after the person passed and not kept by the defendant. He also claimed the Will is not signed or attested by any Justice of Peace or District Officer and no records to confirm the Will.
He said he made a police report to question why his younger brother had done this and submitted the report to the District Officer who directed the Native Court to investigate. Lastly he claimed the case was initially heard in chamber in December last year but the defendant did not attend.
He pleaded for the court to take action as per the Native Laws.
 
In his statement of defence, the younger brother refuted that the ADO refused to sign but only asked all the siblings to be present. He claimed that it was difficult to look for his brother even in his house even for the three days he was on leave and that is the reason his name was left out.
He also claimed ignorance of the law requiring all members of the family to be present when signing the statutory declaration before a Commissioner of Oaths, Justice of Peace(JP) or District Officer, for the document to be valid.
He also informed that the JP at Kota Kinabalu only asked him to confirm that the signatures were those of his siblings before he signed as witness to the document.
After this, he had submitted the documents to the District Office for the purpose of withdrawing the money from their late father’s bank account which is around RM800.00.
As for the Will, he said it was not relevant to the issue in this dispute and requested it to be excluded. He also challenged the plaintiff’s allegation he did not turn up in the last hearing claiming he did not receive any letter or notice to appear.
 
As the defendant is working in Sarawak, the court allowed him to propose a suitable date for the verdict.  The court then set the verdict to be on 29 February this year.
•