MBPJ‘s premises almost sealed
Councillors at the fullboard meeting expressing their disappointment that they were not informed of the issue beforehand.
It is not common to see court bailiffs waiting at the doorstep of a local council to seal the premises.
This is exactly what transpired at the Petaling Jaya City Council (MBPJ) last Friday.
Court bailiffs were at the MBPJ headquarters at Jalan Yong Shook Lin to seal the premises as the council had violated a Shah Alam High Court order to pay close to RM16mil in compensation to the aggrieved party.
However, the premises was not sealed as MBPJ had filed an appeal at the Court of Appeal.
Petaling Jaya mayor Mohd Azizi Mohd Zain explained that the matter was related to a court case over a 3R recycling boxes project in collaboration with a contractor.
When the project was terminated due to poor performance, a third party, which had an agreement with the contractor, summoned the council when it suffered losses.
The Shah Alam High Court recently decided that MBPJ should pay compensation close to RM16mil including interest to the third party.
Mohd Azizi said the council may have delayed in filing the appeal resulting in the bailiffs waiting at the council’s doorstep last Friday.
“Due to its urgency, the council wrote a cheque for about RM16mil and also filed the appeal. This cheque is with the council's lawyers.
“We have not paid the compensation because the case is now at the Court of Appeal.
“This case is not over. We are in the appealing process,” he said.
Mohd Azizi added that the appeal set for Tuesday did not go on as the presiding judge was on medical leave and they were waiting for the next hearing date.
He added that in any case, the council had good financial standing and money was not an issue.
“If a council has a lot of debt and has no money to pay off its debt it can be sealed.
“However, MBPJ is not in that situation, but we want to appeal instead of paying,” he said.
The matter did not go down well with most city councillors during yesterday’s full board meeting.
Mohd Azizi told reporters later that the council lawyers would explain the matter in detail to all councillors.
“I also want to hear what has transpired from our lawyers in detail,” he said.
City councillors questioned why they were not informed over the severity of the issue beforehand.
They said the issue must be audited and there should be better standard operating procedures to ensure it did not recur.
Councillor Derek Fernandez said there was also a time period between the court order and the enforcement of the judgment.
He hoped there would be a standard operating procedure to enable councillors with legal background to supervise and help prepare the arguments of the council lawyers.
