Shah Alam Community Forest Society (SACF) secretary Alicia Teoh said the construction should be halted since the NGO had already appealed to the Federal Court for leave to initiate judicial review proceedings on Bukit Cherakah’s status.

This followed the Court of Appeal’s decision on Jan 24 to dismiss the appeal by SACF and the Association for the Protection of Natural Heritage of Malaysia (Peka) to challenge Bukit Cherakah’s degazettement as a forest reserve.

The courts never issued an order barring development in the area.

In a statement, Teoh said SACF and Peka filed the judicial review application in August 2022 as they believed the Selangor government had acted unlawfully in degazetting the forest reserve without prior notice.

“The forested land in question covers 406 hectares of mostly intact and biodiverse rainforest which forms a critical ecological corridor for over 300 species of wildlife here, including the endangered Malayan tapir,” she said.

She said the state government must halt the construction out of respect for public interest in the legal case until the apex court decides on their application.

FMT has reached out to Jamaliah Jamaluddin, who oversees the public health and environment portfolio, for comment.

In 2022, the Shah Alam High Court denied the two NGOs leave to initiate a judicial review of the state government’s decision to degazette Bukit Cherakah.

The gazette was published on May 5, 2022, some 22 years after the decision was made in 2000. The NGOs claimed it was illegal for the Selangor government to “backdate” the impugned gazette.

Their appeal to the Court of Appeal was unanimously dismissed last January as the application was filed out of time.

Justice Azizah Nawawi said the NGOs should have filed the application in 2000, within three months of the state government’s decision to degazette the forest reserve.