MOHAMMED SHAIPUDIN BIN ABDUL BASIR v 1. ) YANG BERBAHAGIA DATO HAJI MOHD FAUZI BIN HAJI YATIM 2. ) MOHD RIZAL BIN JOHARI 3. ) KAPTEN (B) HAJI ABU HASSAN

Case Significance

Confirms that a local authority's approval of a seasonal bazaar site withstands challenge where the challenger's originating process is procedurally defective and no serious triable issue is shown, and that an ex-parte injunction obtained on that basis will be discharged.

This High Court decision at Shah Alam arose from a dispute over the right to run an Eid bazaar (a Bazar Aidilfitri) at a car park in Bandar Baru Sungai Buloh for the 2025 festive season. The plaintiff sued as chairman representing the Sungai Buloh Muslim Traders' Association (Persatuan Peniaga Islam Sungai Buloh), whose members had applied for the bazaar site. The defendants were the Mayor and the Acting Director of Licensing of the Shah Alam City Council (Majlis Bandaraya Shah Alam), which had refused the traders' application and instead approved the event for a residents' association, together with the chairman of that residents' association. The plaintiff had obtained an ex-parte injunction and then sought to make it inter partes under Order 29 rule 1 of the Rules of Court 2012, while the defendants applied to set the ex-parte order aside. The court's central concern was procedural regularity: it held that the plaintiff's originating process (Saman Pemula) was defective, that the residents' association had no locus to organise the bazaar or to collect money from traders, and that the plaintiff had not shown a bona fide serious issue to be tried. Judicial Commissioner Hazizah Kassim found wujud kecacatan yang fatal dalam Saman Pemula plaintif (there was a fatal defect in the plaintiff's originating summons). The court allowed both sets of defendants' applications to set aside the ex-parte injunction, each with costs, dismissed the plaintiff's inter-partes injunction application with costs, and struck out the originating summons dengan ganti rugi untuk ditaksirkan (with damages to be assessed). The judgment illustrates how a local authority's licensing decision over a seasonal bazaar site is insulated from challenge where the challenger's originating process is procedurally defective and no serious triable issue is shown, and how an ex-parte injunction obtained on such a footing is liable to be discharged.