IPOH: The Hillrise Coffee 16, located in Canning Garden, remains open despite protests from local residents and lacking proper authorisation from the Ipoh City Council (MBI).
The cafe director, Vincent Perera, said there is no reason to close as the application for a business licence is still under process, despite being rejected twice by the local authorities.
Perera said that the claim that the property remains classified as residential is false, as the land was designated for commercial use on Oct 19, 2023.
"One of the activities allowed under the commercial zoning is the operation of food and beverage outlets.
"Although our business licence application was denied twice, we are currently in the process of applying for planning approval (KM20) for the business.
"We have yet to receive any feedback from the authorities on this, so there is no basis for us to stop operating," Perera said this during a press conference at the cafe today.
He said that neighbouring properties, also designated for commercial use, were granted business licences by the MBI.
"How is this fair? Other houses along the same street with the same land status were approved for business licences, but ours was rejected, supposedly because the land is still considered residential.
"We hired two professional planning consultants to review the land's status, and both confirmed that it has been zoned for commercial purposes," he said.
He added that he only invested in the cafe after receiving confirmation that the land's status had been changed to commercial.
"And the business licence can only be issued by local authorities after the business and renovation works are set up.
"That is why we renovated the house into a cafe, costing about RM200,000, minimum. However, despite all this, we still can't obtain a licence, which we feel is entirely unfair," he said.
On Thursday, residents of Canning Garden expressed their frustration after a coffee shop, which has been operating for a year, violated their rights.
The affected residents of Canning Garden include those living on Persiaran Papan, Persiaran Woods, Lebuh Woods, Laluan Papan, and Jalan Papan.
Speaking on behalf of the residents, D.M. Hemavathy said the community was deeply concerned about commercial businesses operating in Canning Garden, particularly along Jalan Papan and Lebuh Cecil Rae.
Hemavathy said that the presence of the cafe has led to increased traffic and congestion, creating numerous problems for the residents.
Perera also claimed that the issue had become politicised, as the previous councillor, Albert Ho, who was assisting them, belonged to a different political party than the current councillor, Lam Yew Tact.
"We have tried multiple times to contact Canning assemblywoman Jenny Choy and Ipoh Timur MP Howard Lee through emails and WhatsApp to discuss the matter, but we were unable to reach them," he said.
When asked if he had met with the residents before opening the cafe, he said it wasn't necessary since their land had already been zoned for commercial use.
"The only party we need to approach is the local authorities for the necessary approvals," he said.