Estuari in Iskandar Puteri, Johor Baru, which covers about 160ha, is one of UEM Sunrise's projects. The first phase of development for Estuari is Estuari Gardens.

KUALA LUMPUR: UEM Sunrise Bhd’s indirect unit Bandar Nusajaya Development Sdn Bhd (BND) won against the Inland Revenue Board (IRB) in two lower courts, but its luck ran out at the Federal Court, the country’s highest court.

The property developer, which is ultimately controlled by Khazanah Nasional Bhd (66.06% indirect stake), told Bursa Malaysia that the Federal Court had ruled in favour of IRB, which sought additional tax and penalty totalling RM73.84mil from BND.

UEM Sunrise said the court also instructed BND to follow the alternative appeal route provided under Section 99 of the Income Tax Act 1967 and appeal the matter to the Special Commissioners of Income Tax.

“Accordingly, the Notice of Additional Assessment (Form JA) from the IRB dated Sept 22, 2011 has now become due and payable. The additional tax and penalty is RM50,921,871.28 and RM22,914,840.73 respectively,” it said.

The company said BND would immediately begin its appeal before the Special Commissioner of Income Tax by filing an application for extension of time to lodge an appeal pursuant to Section 100 of the Income Tax Act 1967.

BND is one of the major subsidiaries of the UEM Sunrise group with most of the landbank in Nusajaya (now renamed Iskandar Puteri) being held by BND and its subsidiaries.

To recap, BND received in October 2011 the notice of additional assessment from the IRB which asked it to pay additional tax and penalty of RM73.84mil in respect of the year of assessment 2006.

In September 2012, the Kuala Lumpur High Court had allowed BND’s judicial review application to set aside the additional tax assessment. Ruling in favour of BND, it declared that the IRB had no legal basis to raise the additional tax assessment.

The IRB then appealed but the Court of Appeal in May 2014 dismissed its appeal with costs of RM30,000. The following month the IRB filed an application for leave to the Federal Court.

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