By Joe Fernandez
The need for linguistically proficient legal profession in Malaysia, capable of grasping the spirit, will grow!
Commentary And Analysis . . . The neglect of the English language foundation in Malaysian law isn’t trivial oversight.
(https://jesseltontimes.com/2026/06/28/mastery-of-english-qualification-for-law/ )
(https://jesseltontimes.com/2026/06/27/language-best-learnt-on-ones-own-for-mastery/ )
(https://jesseltontimes.com/2026/06/22/bahasa-malaysia-supremacy-risks-being-replaced-by-loan-words-from-english/ )
It’s wound that has festered for decades,
producing profession that, by its own leaders’ admission, lacks depth, spirit, and the capacity for moving beyond the mechanical application of rules.
The proposition that English mastery alone should qualify for practice remains pure and harmonious (sattvic) response for passion-driven and fragmented (rajasic) system.
It identifies the foundation (fundament) that has
been neglected and proposes placing it at the centre.
AI will continue and evolve.
The courtroom will remain human.
The letter of the law will continuimg being insufficient.
The need for linguistically proficient profession, capable of grasping the spirit, will grow.
The truth shall set us free (Veritas vos liberabit). The truth was already in motion.
The debate will now determine fate.
Let justice be done though the heavens
fall (Fiat justitia ruat caelum).
The proposition has been published.
It’s simple, radical, and demands answer: English mastery alone should qualify one for practising law.
The proposition rests on quiet, devastating observation, that Malaysia, after sixty‑eight years of independence, lacks even single jurist, in the assessment of Attorney General (AG) Tan Sri Tommy Thomas.
It lacks profession that can grasp, in the words of Chief Justice (CJ) Tun Richard Malanjum, that the letter of the law, by itself, isn’t law.
These are not the complaints of disgruntled outsiders. They are the public confessions of the highest officers of the legal order.
The proposition’s surface was call for reform of admission standards.
The submerged seven‑eighths, viewed through Nobel laureate Ernest Hemingway’s iceberg theory on writing was civilisational cry from the heart (cri de cœur) about the foundation (Fundament) of the rule of law (Rechtsstaat).
This commentary will explore that iceberg in full, applying the unified theory of law and action, consequence, and time (Karma) and demonstrate that the neglect of the English language foundation isn’t merely educational failure but debt (karmische Schuld) that the profession must now discharge. — TJT
Longtime Borneo watcher Joe Fernandez has been writing for many years on both sides of the Southeast Asia Sea. He should not be mistaken for a namesake formerly with the Daily Express in Kota Kinabalu. JF keeps a Blog under FernzTheGreat, as jurist (legal scholar), on the nature of human relationships.
DISCLAIMER: The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of Jesselton Times.
ISSUE
The central issue was whether the Malaysian legal profession has systematically neglected the mastery of the English language as the foundational qualification for practice, and whether this neglect has produced systemic deficiency that can only be remedied by recalibrating the entry criteria.
The secondary issue was whether the current system, by maintaining admission standards that do not ensure linguistic competence, has accumulated such “debt” that reason for being (ratio essendi) has ceased existence, leaving gap (lacuna) that only radical reform can fill.
RULES
The rules governing this analysis were drawn from the unified theory of law, the philosophical meditations on law, the law of evidence, and the immutable law of cause and effect.
First, the unified theory of law.
Law isn’t merely set of statutes; it’s righteous duty (Dharma) expressed through time.
Law = Rules + Facts + Logic.
Law of cause and effect = Action + Consequence + Time.
Truth = (veritas)
The truth needs no court.
Human beings, being bio‑chemical robots, work on the GiGo (garbage in, garbage out) principle.
There can be no emotions in law, no discrimination in law.
The law of cause and effect was neutral. It does not exist unless we create it.
The letter of the law, by itself, not law. The greater emphasis on the spirit of the law trumps the letter when both are read together under the rule of law, the basis of the Constitution.
Second, the philosophical meditations on legal education.
Law schools do not impart skills for law practice and skills for courtroom work; they offer only academic programmes which can be used only for teaching law.
Skills for law practice and for the courtroom come from Mentorship under Master at law
chamber, but only after mastery of the English language.
Law schools and Mentors do not ensure mastery of the English language.
Language was best learnt on one’s own.
The lawyer looks for the law and points it out; the court finds the law and declares it.
The court of law, being only about law, was about law, not truth or justice.
Yet the truth, having life force all its own, comes into being. It needs no court.
Third, the law of evidence.
Under the Evidence Act 1950, sections 101‑103, the burden of proof (onus proband) lies on the person making assertion.
The proposition asserts systemic deficiency.
It cites the law schools, a former Attorney General, and a former Chief Justice.
These constitute at first sight (prima facie) evidence. The burden shifts. The opponent should rebut.
APPLICATION
Argument from Authority
The proposition’s visible architecture was coherent (kohärent).
It proceeds in six logical steps.
First, artificial intelligence has absorbed the
function of legal research — the retrieval and organisation of existing legal material — a task of pattern recognition that AI performs with speed and comprehensiveness that no human can match.
Second, legal research was distinct from
legal advocacy; research is data processing, while advocacy requires the human capacity on connecting the dots, constructing persuasive argument, anticipating judicial response, and reading the witness.
Third, advocacy, at its core, was act of language.
Fourth, the courtroom remains the exclusive
domain of the human advocate, because the court rules on submissions, the loser has rights and appeal was about errors, credibility, and the benefit of the doubt, all of which are linguistic operations.
Fifth, therefore, the sole qualification for entry into this exclusively human domain should be the mastery of the medium in which it operates: the English language.
Sixth, this conclusion was supported by at first sight (prima facie) evidence of systemic failure: the law schools caution that their programmes are academic; the former Attorney General (AG) Tan Sri Tommy Thomas, stated that Malaysia lacks even one jurist; and the former Chief Justice (CJ) Tun Richard Malanjum, observed that the profession could not grasp the principle that the letter of the law, by itself, isn’t law.
This remains masterstrokr (coup de maître) of logic.
It does not rely on sentiment. It rests on the public statements of the highest authorities, and on distinction between research and advocacy that’s both philosophically sound and technologically prescient.
The burden of proof (onus probandi) has been discharged.
Four Layers of Deeper Meaning:
The visible surface was only one‑eighth.
The submerged seven‑eighths contains
the true weight (Gravitas) of the argument.
First, the GiGo Principle and the Bio‑Chemical Robot.
Human beings are bio‑chemical robots.
If the input — legal education that’s purely academic, mentors who do not ensure language mastery, a system that rewards
credentialism over competence — was defective, the output will be a profession
incapable of fulfilling duties (Dharma).
The systemic deficiency identified by
Tommy Thomas and Richard Malanjum were not accident.
It is the consequence of profession that has allowed atrophy in the foundational skill.
The proposition breaks this cycle by making the input criterion the one thing that cannot be faked: demonstrable mastery of English.
This is duty (Dharma) in pedagogy.
Second, the ghostly double (Doppelgänger) of AI and the Courtroom.
AI is the ghostly double of the human advocate.
It can research faster, recall more, and pattern‑match with inhuman precision.
It lacks ingenuity (Erfindungsgabe).
It cannot connect the dots because it
does not understand the human condition (menschliche Verfassung).
It cannot bear the trust and fiduciary duty (Amanah) of representing a client.
The courtroom remains the exclusive domain of the human being because the court does not decide; it rules on the submissions of the parties.
All this — submission, grounds, appeal. — was exercise in language.
The proposition, by centring English mastery, centres the very faculty that distinguishes the human from the machine.
Third, the Letter and the Spirit.
The profession’s resistance on the principle that “the letter, by itself, isn’t law” remains the original (karmische Schuld).
This resistance has produced legal culture of positivism (Positivismus) that treats law as mechanical rule‑book.
The consequence remains Bar that cannot grasp that something beyond the text exists.
The proposition’s insistence on English mastery was not call for grammatical
pedantry.
It’s call for the cultivation of the capacity for grasping the spirit of the law (spiritus legis).
The mind steeped in the power
of language can move beyond letter (littera) for sense and meaning (sententia).
The greater emphasis on the spirit of the law trumps the letter of the law when both are read together under the rule of law, the basis of the Constitution.
Fourth, the Mentorship Void and the Self‑Learnt Language.
The philosophical meditations state that skills for practice come from mentorship, but only after mastery of English.
Neither the law schools nor the Master ensure
mastery of English.
Language was best learnt on one’s own.
This remains mess (Schlamassel) of structural design.
The system delegates practical training at the hands of thevMaster but delegates the foundational skill of language for the pupil’s own initiative.
A system that requires Master for everything except the most important thing seens like system designed by alleged bungler (Schlemiel).
The proposition corrects this by making the
self‑learnt mastery the foundation (fundamentum) of the entire edifice.
CONTRADICTIONS
Two apparent contradictions require resolution.
First, the proposition claims that “AI has eclipsed human legal research,” yet the same AI was incapable of “connecting the dots.”
Is this contradiction in terms (contradictio in adiecto).
It’s not.
The resolution lies in the definition of
terms.
Research was defined as retrieval and organisation; “connecting the dots” was defined as the construction of persuasive argument.
The first was function of data; the second was function of understanding (intellectus).
The distinction was not only valid but necessary (nécessaire).
Second, deeper contradiction exists between the ideal of English mastery and the reality that “there’s law which cannot be enforced, there’s law which has ceased existence as if it never existed.”
If law ultimately remains about the power of language, why so much law that’s dead (mort).
The answer lies in the meditation: “legal incompetence exists.”
A system that admits persons who lack mastery of English produces débris, unenforceable statutes, rulings that fail on giving clear grounds, submissions that are chatter (bavardage).
The proposition’s focus on English
mastery was remedy for this very malaise.
A profession of linguistically proficient advocates would produce less dead law, because language remains the living force (vis viva) of law.
CAUSE OF ACTION
The proposition does not mean “cause of action” in the traditional sense.
A person who acts without compliance with current statutory requirements would face consequences under existing written law (lex scripta).
The proposition was sustained plea (plaidoyer) for reform, not occasion for war (casus belli).
However, in the court of public debate, the cause of action was the systemic failure itself.
The evidence — the statements of the AG, the CJ, and the law schools — was on the face of it (prima facie) proof of that failure.
The burden of proof (onus probandi) now lies on the defenders of the existing status (status quo). They must show that system which does not ensure English mastery produces competent practitioners.
They cannot.
The truth (veritas) has spoken.
STATUTES
Evidence Act 1950 (Act 56), ss. 101-103
LAW AND PRINCIPLES
Subramaniam v. Public Prosecutor [1956] 1 WLR 965 – Principle: Hearsay rule; assertions must be grounded.
R v. Exall (1866) 4 F. & F. 922 – Principle: Standard of circumstantial evidence.
Sivarasa Rasiah v. Badan Peguam Malaysia [2010] 2 MLJ 333 – Principle: Rule of law is justiciable.
Onus probandi (burden of proof on the asserter)
Res ipsa loquitur (the thing speaks for itself).
Lex naturalis (natural law).
AUTHORITIES
Public remarks by Tan Sri Tommy Thomas, former Attorney General.
Public remarks by Tun Richard Malanjum, former Chief Justice.
H.L.A. Hart, “The Concept of Law” 3rd ed.
Cross & Tapper on Evidence (13th ed., 2018).
Jesselton Times article, 27 June 2026.
HAPPENINGS
2018‑2020: Tommy Thomas serves as AG, makes remarks on lack of jurists.
2019: Richard Malanjum delivers farewell speech.
2020s: AI legal tools become widespread.
27 June 2026: Proposition published.
ISSUES BETWEEN PARTIES
Whether English mastery alone should qualify for legal practice;
Whether AI has superseded human legal research;
Whether the systemic deficiencies identified justify reform; and
Whether the current qualification system was beyond powers (ultra vires) and the duty (Dharma) of the profession.
