KUALA LUMPUR: Muar member of Parliament Syed Saddiq Syed Abdul Rahman has failed in his legal bid to challenge the government over the alleged withholding of RM730,300 allocated for his constituency last year.
Judge Datuk Wan Ahmad Farid Wan Salleh dismissed Syed Saddiq's leave application for a judicial review, citing that the former Malaysian United Democratic Alliance (Muda) president's application was filed out of time.
"It is settled law that an application for leave filed out of time is frivolous and vexatious.
"Furthermore, since there is no legal or constitutional provision mandating such allocations by the government, the issue of any failure to allocate being unlawful or unconstitutional does not arise.
"It has not been shown to me that the allocation of funds in the form of special allocation is mandated by any legal or constitutional prohibition.
"Thus, this court no longer have the jurisdiction to hear the judicial review," he said.
Syed Saddiq when met after the proceeding said he would file an appeal over the decision.
Syed Saddiq and three others — Najib Abu Nawar, Mohd Bakirudin Abdullah and Muhamad Fadzly Bisri — filed the judicial review on April 23 this year.
Najib is the Parent-Teacher Association (PIBG) chairman of a school in Muar, while Bakiruddin and Fadzly are an imam and chairperson from two different surau in the Muar parliamentary constituency.
They named Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim and the government as the respondents.
The trio are seeking a court order to set aside a decision by the respondents that halted the balance of RM500,000 from RM1.7 million in total that was supposed to be channelled directly to the Muar public service centre.
The funds were meant for the expenses of welfare programmes for the Muar constituents.
The applicants are also seeking Syed Saddiq's access to the myKHAS system to be reinstated. Syed Saddiq had claimed that his access was revoked by the respondents.
Syed Saddiq, in his supporting affidavit, claimed that Muda had, on Sept 10 last year, decided to withdraw its support from the unity government. He claimed that shortly after the announcement was made, the respondents stopped or revoked the RM500,000 balance in his allocation.
He said the allocation was meant to fix public amenities like schools and surau. The applicants are also seeking damages, relief and costs.
ENDS