Member Article

Dear valued clients, colleagues and friends,

The High Court ruled that it has no jurisdiction to injunct an application to recognize and enforcean arbitral award on the basis that there are no sums due and owing under the arbitral award.

Danieli Co., Ltd filed an application to recognize and enforce a foreign arbitral award. Southern HRC Sdn Bhd applied to injunct and set aside the same on the ground that the sums due under thearbitral award had been set aside by sums due under another arbitral award.

The High Court ruled that it has no jurisdiction to grant the reliefs sought by Southern HRC Sdn Bhd by reason of section 8 of the Arbitration Act 2005. Post-arbitral award intervention is only permitted in the manner stipulated in sections 37 to 39 of the Arbitration Act 2005, not in any other manner. The injunction sought to restrain statutory recognition for the arbitral award. That isbeyond the jurisdiction conferred on courts by the Arbitration Act 2005.

This decision reinforces section 8 of the Arbitration Act 2005 and how jealously the courts of Malaysia guard party autonomy enshrined in section 8 of the Arbitration Act 2005. The limited judicial intervention is always to support and never to stymie the arbitral process.

For assistance on this and related matters, do contact Shanti Mogan, Lilien Wong and Yiew De Quan, who acted forDanieli Co., Ltd, the plaintiff in the application to recognize and enforce the arbitral award and the defendant in the injunction application.