A three-man Court of Appeal bench today allowed the Attorney-General’s appeal to reverse the High Court ruling which granted Nurul and 10 other voters in that constituency leave for a judicial review.
“We find merit in the appeal and the Jan 3 ruling of the High Court is set aside,” Justice Umi Kalthum Abdul Majid said in delivering the unanimous verdict.
Federal Counsel Amarjeet Singh today submitted that the local inquiry carried out in Lembah Pantai last November was not flawed.
He said it was unnecessary for all the seven EC commissioners to be present to hear the complaints by the minimum 100 voters.
“The voters were also given sufficient time to prepare their objections,” he added.
Amarjeet said the EC also gave the complainants a fair hearing.
High Court judge Azizul Azmi Adnan, who allowed the application by Nurul and the voters had fixed Wednesday (Feb 15) to hear the merits of the case.
Following today’s ruling, Nurul’s lawyer Surenthra Ananth said the hearing date would be vacated.
Azizul had said on Jan 3 that Nurul’s application was not frivolous and the applicants had legal standing to file the case.
He said the EC was only involved in a decision-making process and it was susceptible to judicial review by the court.
The applicants who filed the judicial review application last November had named the EC, its chairman Mohd Hashim Abdullah and secretary Abdul Ghani Salleh as respondents.
Nurul said the redelineation exercise went against the fundamental principle of “one person, one vote, one value” due to gerrymandering and apportioning seats that would favour the incumbent.
In an immediate response to today’s ruling, Nurul said her challenge had paralysed the EC’s plan to redraw election boundaries in 14 parliamentary seats in Kuala Lumpur.
The High Court on January 3 had also granted Nurul a stay to prevent the EC from conducting a boundary demarcation pending the outcome of her judicial review application.
“It is a small victory but the larger issue is that our legal challenge has educated and created awareness among the people on the conduct of the EC,” she said.
Nurul, who is also PKR election director, said, she would discuss with her lawyers whether to take this matter to the Federal Court.