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• Opinion: Triumph for the basic charter

©The Star (Used by permission)

PUTRAJAYA: The Government has agreed to look into a Bar Council proposal to amend the National Land Code, following a recent Court of Appeal ruling over a land purchase.

Natural Resources and Environment Minister Datuk Seri Adzmi Khalid said that while the executive could not interfere with the judiciary’s decision, it agreed on the possibility of amending the laws.

“Whatever amendment this ministry does, must be with the approval of the Attorney-General’s Chambers,” he told reporters after meeting a delegation led by Bar Council chairman Ambiga Sreenevasan yesterday. 

The group had handed to him a memorandum on the prevention and protection against fraudulent land transactions.

He advised them to also submit a similar memorandum to the Attorney-General’s Chambers.

The issue came about after Court of Appeal judge Gopal Sri Ram said there was no need to follow a Federal Court decision that wrongly interpreted a section of the code.

The judge said this in connection with the case of Adorna Properties Sdn Bhd vs Boonsom Boonyanit, where the apex court favoured Adorna Properties on the grounds that the code strictly followed the doctrine of “indefeasibility of title”.

The Court of Appeal allowed an appeal, with costs, by the original property owners – brothers Au Meng Nam and Ming Kong – who lost their land to forgers. The Court of Appeal also ordered that the title to the property be registered in their (the brothers’) names, instead of the purchaser, Ung Yak Chew.

On another Bar Council suggestion, Azmi said his ministry would be cautious during the computerisation of procedures of its Land Office transactions.

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