Abdoolcader J

(delivering the judgment of the Court): The short but pivotal point raised for determination in this appeal relates to the capacity of the respondent to institute and maintain the proceedings instituted by him in this matter. This involves the question of his locus standi or standing to sue, scilicet, whether the instigator of an action has the right to bring the mechanism of the court into operation. The Basic Facts

The respondent (and the court has been constantly reminded in these proceedings of his vocation as a fisherman though what his piscatorial pursuit has got to do with his standing to sue is beyond us) and 183 other persons applied in May, 1972 for State land in Sekakap, Mersing in the State of Johore but with no response for some 8 years. It then came to his knowledge, and this is borne out by an official search, that some time in 1976 land in that area had in fact been alienated to more than 100 people, the majority of whom are not resident in Mersing, including the appellant who was at all material times the Menteri Besar of the State of Johore and personages in the upper echelon of the administration such as members of the State Executive Council and Mi