Common Law : Pulang Paku Buah Keras

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم 

Semasa semester 1 pengajian penulis di Universiti, penulis ada terbaca sebuah buku bertajuk Undang-undang Tanah Islam di perpustakaan Universiti. Namun kerana kelemahan diri, penulis tidak dapat hadam buku tersebut secara penuh. Buku tersebut ada menerangkan bagaimana Rasulullah SAW mengurus tanah ketika zamannya, setelah itu beralih kepada zaman  Saidina Umar Al-Khattab yang membuat pembaharuan. Dizaman Rasulullah SAW tanah dibahagikan kepada 3 jenis tanah manakala di zaman Saidina Umar Al-Khattab terbahagi kepada 5 jenis. Kemudian kembali kepada sejarah tanah di Malaysia. Sesungguhnya tanah itu, yang memiliknya tiadalah yang lain selain daripada Allah SWT.

Apapun setelah sekian lama, timbul beberapa topik yang diperbincangkan antara penulis dan sahabat-sahabat. Perkara yang dibincangkan ialah 'common law'. Apa yang penulis faham, ia adalah keputusan kehakiman yang lepas yang menjadi rujukan hakim untuk membuat keputusan.

Apabila carian internet dilakukan, maka wikipedia merupakan dapatan pertama. Wikiperdi berbahasa Inggeris lebih menepati citarasa penulis berbanding  bahasa ibunda. Alhamdulillah, masih ada sumber yang menapak kehadapan.

Common law (also known as case law or precedent) is law developed by judges through decisions of courts and similar tribunals rather than through legislative statutes or executive branch action. A "common law system" is a legal system that gives great precedential weight to common law, on the principle that it is unfair to treat similar facts differently on different occasions. The body of precedent is called "common law" and it binds future decisions. In cases where the parties disagree on what the law is, a common law court looks to past precedential decisions of relevant courts. If a similar dispute has been resolved in the past, the court is bound to follow the reasoning used in the prior decision (this principle is known as stare decisis). If, however, the court finds that the current dispute is fundamentally distinct from all previous cases (called a "matter of first impression"), judges have the authority and duty to make law by creating precedent. Thereafter, the new decision becomes precedent, and will bind future courts.

In practice, common law systems are considerably more complicated than the simplified system described above. The decisions of a court are binding only in a particular jurisdiction, and even within a given jurisdiction, some courts have more power than others. For example, in most jurisdictions, decisions by appellate courts are binding on lower courts in the same jurisdiction and on future decisions of the same appellate court, but decisions of lower courts are only non-binding persuasive authority. Interactions between common law, constitutional law, statutory law and regulatory law also give rise to considerable complexity. However, stare decisis, the principle that similar cases should be decided according to consistent principled rules so that they will reach similar results, lies at the heart of all common law systems.

1/3rd of the world's population (2.3bn) live in common law jurisdictions, particularly in England where it originated in the Middle Ages, and countries that trace their legal heritage to England as former colonies of the British Empire, including: India, the United States, Pakistan, Nigeria, Bangladesh, Canada, Malaysia, Ghana, Australia, Sri Lanka, Hong Kong, Singapore, Ireland, New Zealand, Jamaica, Trinidad & Tobago, Cyprus and Barbados. South Africa, Zimbabwe, Cameroon, Namibia, Botswana, Guyana and Israel have mixed systems with significant admixtures of civil law. Sumber

Secara ringkasnya, kes-kes terdahulu menjadi rujukan dan mendapat tempat dalam memutuskan keputusan kehakiman.

Andaian penulis,
Zack (warga asing) mencuri suatu barang yang harta sultan, lantas perkara tersebut tidak dinyatakan cara menghukumnya. Atas sebab murka sultan terhadap Zack, Sultan mengarahkan agar Zack dipotong tangan kerana telah bersalah mencuri barang yang sangat berharga.

Datanglah si Zabri (warganegara) mencuri barang yang sama milih Barzula(warganegara). Merujuk kepada kes Zack Vs Sultan, Zack dipotong tangan kerana mencuri barang yang berharga. Lantas si Zabri dipotong tangan kerana mencuri barang yang sangat berharga.

Kemudian,
Dalam satu kes, Antu(wanita warganegara) menfailkan tuduhan mencuri barang berharga miliknya terhadap Baji(lelaki warganegara), barang itu ialah dara si Antu, merujuk kepada kes Zabri Vs Barzula, maka mahkamah menyetujui bahawa dara si Antu ni tiada nilai, maka si Baji juga didapati bersalah. Lantas hilanglah tangan si Baji ni.

Semestinya kehakiman telah mempunyai keputusan yang lebih tepat dari ini iaitu engan pelbagai akta, tort dan lain-lain. Namun harapan penulis tetap Islam sebagai undang-undang tetap Malaysia, bumi tercinta ini.

Namun, andai berakhir dengan andaian. Penulis berharap mana-mana yang membaca 'entry' ni tidak menjadikan ia sebagai rujukan. Penulis juga berlapang dada menerima kritikan, saranan, komen dan pembetulan dari pembaca sekalian.

Jika ada tersalah jalan, jangan biarkan penulis semakin sesat.