SHAH ALAM, Sept 29 — The High Court has found the Malaysian government liable for damages caused by the catastrophic 2021 floods that devastated Taman Sri Muda in Shah Alam, citing a failure to promptly escalate disaster response and maintain effective mitigation systems.

Judicial Commissioner Shoba Rajah Dorai Rajah allowed the lawsuit filed by 50 residents, ruling that they had proven their claims of negligence and breach of duty by the defendants.

The respondents included the government of Malaysia, the director-general of the National Disaster Management Agency (Nadma), the minister in the Prime Minister’s Department (Special Functions), the director-general of the Malaysian Meteorological Department (METMalaysia), and the minister of environment and water.

The court also found the director-general of the Selangor Department of Irrigation and Drainage (DID) and the Shah Alam City Council (MBSA) jointly liable with the federal government.

“The court therefore holds that the plaintiffs have established a foreseeable duty of care arising from the defendants’ operational functions and disaster-management responsibilities,” Shoba said.

The court rejected the defendants’ attempt to use an “act of God” defence, ruling it inapplicable when reasonable human intervention could have mitigated the disaster.

“Once an agency undertakes meteorological monitoring and national rescue operations, it is required to exercise reasonable competence in carrying out those functions.

“The defence based on unforeseeability is therefore limited to circumstances in which no reasonable human intervention could have prevented or mitigated the consequences,” she said.

The ruling noted that while technical data confirmed the unprecedented rainfall on December 18, 2021, the state possessed the means to detect the severity of the event but failed to translate that data into an actionable plan to protect citizens.

Consequently, the court accepted that liability for the operational failures of Nadma and METMalaysia rested with the federal government.

“Nadma failed to escalate the disaster response, maintain a Disaster Operations Control Centre (PKOB) and deploy the Special Malaysia Disaster Assistance and Rescue Team (SMART) unit effectively (which affected the timely provision of rescue assistance).

“METMalaysia failed to issue timely warnings at the appropriate danger category despite its forecast activity benchmarks,” she said.

The court identified a systemic collapse in disaster management, including the lack of public awareness programmes in Taman Sri Muda despite its known status as a flood-prone area, and a failure to identify the correct disaster tier, which delayed critical intervention.

Bureaucratic failures further compounded the crisis, with delays in transmitting information from district to state levels and a lack of appointed liaison officers to coordinate the response. This left search-and-rescue efforts largely to non-governmental organisations and local community members.

Regarding DID Selangor, Shoba ruled that the agency could not avoid liability simply because rainfall exceeded infrastructure benchmarks.

“Once the assets were constructed and placed into operation, DID assumed a continuing duty to maintain, upgrade and operate them with reasonable competence.

“The defence that the capacity of the infrastructure had been exceeded is therefore insufficient where operational failures have compounded the problem,” she said.

Similarly, MBSA was found unable to evade its statutory obligations by claiming that retention ponds and primary infrastructure belonged to DID. The court held that ownership did not negate MBSA’s independent duty under street, drainage, and building legislation to maintain the public drainage system within its jurisdiction.

The court fixed October 6 for case management to determine a hearing date for the assessment of damages.

The 50 residents were represented by James Joshua Paulra, Regine Ng, and Ahmad Badri. Senior federal counsels Mohammad Al-Saifi Hashim, Nurul Farhana Khalid, and Liew Horng Bin appeared for the federal government, while state legal counsel Faris Shah Kamarulzaman and lawyer Norazalina Hairuddin appeared for JPS Selangor and MBSA respectively.