Cecil Abraham & Partners

Cecil Abraham & Partners provides exceptional legal advice and representation to its clients. Established in 2015, Cecil Abraham & Partners is a cutting-edge law firm in Malaysia specialising in dispute resolution.

 The firm is headed by Tan Sri Dato’ Cecil Abraham - one of Malaysia’s leading litigators and one of Asia’s leading international arbitration practitioners.

The quality of our work is internationally acknowledged and marks us as one of Malaysia’s leading law firms.

Cecil Abraham & Partners provides a full range of legal services – advisory, strategic, preventative and, if it comes to it, the resolution of disputes. The firm advises and acts for Fortune 500 companies, media conglomerates, government-linked companies, high net worth individuals to not-for-profit entities, charities, private individuals and private limited companies.

The firm enables clients to realise solutions by providing clarity of thought and advice, as well as delivering smart and efficient dispute resolution solutions. We are the preferred choice when the disputes are complex and the stakes extremely high.

• Administrative and regulatory
• Appellate
• Civil litigation
• Commercial arbitration
• Competition/antitrust
• Financial services regulatory: Contentious
• Insolvency
• International arbitration
• Investment Treaty arbitration
• Litigation
• Professional liability
• Professional malpractice
• Tax
• Trusts and estates
• White-collar crime

In 2021, the firm was involved in several major disputes. Particularly noteworthy, the firm successfully acted for Raub Australian Gold Mining Sdn Bhd is a libel claim against the online publication, Mkini Dotcom Sdn Bhd and its journalists, where for the first time, the Federal Court of Malaysia considered the distinction in the application of the plea of responsible journalism and the defence of reportage. The Federal Court held, that (i) the defence of reportage in law is a separate defence from the defence of qualified privilege or the Reynold’s defence of responsible journalism and is to be treated as mutually exclusive, (ii) the defence of reportage needs to be pleaded expressly and separately from the plea of responsible journalism; and (iii) in a libel claim a company can recover damages for loss of goodwill and reputation as well as vindication of its reputation without having to prove actual loss. The decision of the Federal Court is reported in Mkini Dotcom Sdn Bhd & Ors v Raub Australian Gold Mining Sdn Bhd [2021] 5 MLJ 79. Also noteworthy, is the recent decision of the Federal Court in Catajaya Sdn Bhd v Shoppoint Sdn Bhd & Ors [2021] 2 MLJ 374, wherein the Federal Court has laid down clear guidelines as to how termination clauses in contracts are to be construed in Malaysia. The firm successfully acted for Catajaya Sdn Bhd in reversing the concurrent decisions of the Court of Appeal and High Court in this share sale cum land dispute. The firm also successfully acted for Lynas Malaysia Sdn Bhd in an environmental law dispute instituted by the Anti-Lynas Environmental group in seeking to quash the licence granted by the Government of Malaysia to operate one of the world’s largest rare earth plants in the State of Pahang, Malaysia. The firm continues to be involved in several high profile construction and infrastructure disputes in Malaysia pertaining to the LRT3 Project, amongst others.

• Accounting
• Agriculture
• Automotive
• Aviation
• Banking
• Construction and materials
• Consumer goods and services
• Energy
• Financial services
• Food and beverage
• Forestry
• Gaming
• Government and public policy
• Healthcare
• Industrials
• Insurance
• Investment management
• Media
• Mining
• Natural resources
• Oil and gas
• Pharma and life sciences
• Real estate
• Shipping
• Social infrastructure
• Tech and telecoms
• Tourism
• Transport
• Utilities