PUTRAJAYA: A group of 202 owners and residents of three apartment complexes in Taman Maluri, Cheras, has successfully got the Court of Appeal to quash a Kuala Lumpur City Hall (DBKL) decision allowing a developer to construct yet another apartment complex in the vicinity.
Announcing the verdict, justice Lee Swee Seng also ordered Pavilion Integrity Sdn Bhd to halt construction of the proposed new apartment complex.
Lee chaired a three-man bench that included justices M Gunalan and Nordin Hassan.
Apart from Pavilion, DBKL and the federal territories minister were parties in the appeal.
The court also instructed DBKL to acquire the plot of land allocated for the new apartment complex – known as Lot 810 – and use it to construct a 66ft road for the use of residents to ease their traffic woes.
It noted that Lot 810 was originally designated for road construction under the KL City Plan 2020.
In delivering the unanimous judgment, Lee chastised DBKL for “flip-flopping” on its decisions relating to Lot 810, adding that it was “a misnomer to categorise them as mere proposals”.
He said the final decision made “was irrational and unreasonable as no proper explanation had been proffered to the affected (buyers and residents)”.
“(DBKL’s decisions were) made willy-nilly with no proper and credible reports to explain the deviation from what had been disclosed in the City Plan,” he added.
On March 14, 2018, DBKL had issued a development order in favour of Pavilion which allowed it to build a 45-storey service apartment on the lot.
DBKL also approved a new traffic flow system for the Taman Maluri area.
However, on Dec 7 of the same year, DBKL retracted the development order and said it was sticking to the city planned’s proposal for the 66ft road.
Four months later, DBKL said it had “reconsidered the matter” and was now allowing Pavilion Integrity to proceed with the proposed new serviced apartments.
The house buyers and residents then took out judicial review proceedings to quash DBKL’s decisions pertaining to the apartment complex and the proposed new traffic flow.
On May 21 last year, the Kuala Lumpur High Court dismissed their application and ordered them to pay costs of RM8,000 each to DBKL, the minister and developer. Justice Mariana Yahya said at the time that the application had no merits as the applicants had failed to show that DBKL and the minister had acted unlawfully.
They were represented by lawyers Ambiga Sreenevasan, Ho Kok Yew, Latheefa Koya and Shahid Adli Kamarudin.
Lawyer Haris Salleh Hamzah appeared for DBKL, while Harpal Singh Grewal and S Selvarajah acted for Pavilion Integrity.
Senior federal counsel Nik Noor Nik Kar represented the Federal Territories minister. - FMT
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