MUHAMAD SAFUAN BIN AB. HAMID v 1. ) JAWATANKUASA PERKHIDMATAN, RAYUAN KENAIKAN PANGKAT DAN RAYUAN TATATERTIB MAJLIS DAERAH BACHOK BANDAR PELANCONGAN ISLAM 2. ) MAJLIS DAERAH BACHOK BANDAR PELANCONGAN ISLAM

Case Significance

Illustrates that the doctrine of legitimate expectation protects a public servant where a service committee resiles from a clear earlier decision, and that certiorari lies to quash a later decision contradicting the expectation the authority itself created.

This High Court decision concerns an application for judicial review, by way of certiorari, to quash a decision of a local authority's Service, Promotion Appeal and Disciplinary Appeal Committee, and turns on the doctrine of legitimate expectation. The applicant was an officer of a district council whose confirmation in his post was in issue. By its decision numbered Bil 2 of 2022, made on 14 June 2022, the committee extended the applicant's period of confirmation without penalty for a further year, from 16 January 2022 to 15 January 2023, so creating an expectation that his confirmation would be dealt with over that extended period. However, by a later decision of the same committee, numbered Bil 4 of 2022 and made on 15 August 2022, the committee decided that the extension of the applicant's probationary period could not be considered, a conclusion at odds with its own earlier decision granting the one-year extension. The applicant sought certiorari to set aside the later decision, contending that the committee's earlier decision had given rise to a legitimate expectation on which he was entitled to rely, and that the abrupt reversal was inconsistent with that expectation. The court examined whether the committee's conduct had generated a legitimate expectation and whether the later, contradictory decision could stand against it. It held in the applicant's favour, granting the writ of certiorari to quash the impugned decision. The judgment illustrates how the public-law doctrine of legitimate expectation operates to protect a public servant against an administrative body resiling from a clear earlier decision on which the officer was entitled to rely, and how certiorari is available to quash a later decision that contradicts an expectation the authority itself created. The court's approach reflected the principle that a public body may be held to a clear representation it has made, at least where the affected officer has ordered his affairs in reliance on it, and that an abrupt departure from such a representation, without adequate justification, is amenable to judicial review.