(e) where, upon a consideration of all these matters, the balance of justice lies. D. THE GOVERNING LAW AND FRAMEWORK [14] The power to allow an amendment is conferred by Order 20 rule 5(1) of the Rules of Court 2012, which provides: "Subject to Order 15, rules 6, 6A, 7 and 8 and the following provisions of this rule, the Court may at any stage of the proceedings allow the plaintiff to amend his writ, or any party to amend his pleading, on such terms as to costs or otherwise as may be just and in such manner, if any, as it may direct." [15] The discretion so conferred is wide, but it is not at large. Its classical articulation is that of the Federal Court in Yamaha Motor Co Ltd v Yamaha Malaysia Sdn Bhd & Ors [1983] 1 MLJ 213 (FC), where Mohamed Azmi FJ held that the general principle is that the court will allow such amendments as will cause no injustice to the other party, and identified three basic questions: whether the application is bona fide; whether the prejudice caused to the other side can be compensated by costs; and whether the amendment would turn the suit, in effect, from one of one character into a suit of another and inconsistent character. [16] The liberal philosophy underlying the power is of long standing. In Cropper v Smith (1884) 26 Ch D 700, Bowen LJ observed that the function of the court is to determine the rights of the parties, and not to punish them for mistakes made in the conduct of their pleadings. In Ketteman v Hansel Properties Ltd [1987] AC 189 (HL), the House of Lords reiterated that the controlling consideration is whether allowing the amendment would occasion injustice to the opposing party. [17] That philosophy, however, is not the whole of the law where an amendment is sought late and on the eve of trial. The position was authoritatively restated by the Federal Court in Hong Leong Finance Bhd v Low Thiam Hoe & another appeal [2016] 1 MLJ 301 (FC). The Federal Court held that, where an application to amend introduces a new case in the claim or defence on the eve of trial, the three questions identified in Yamaha Motor are not exhaustive. It observed that relevant considerations include whether the applicant has provided a cogent and reasonable explanation for the delay in bringing the application, whether the application is a tactical manoeuvre, and whether the prejudice occasioned by the lateness of the amendment can truly be cured by an award of costs. [18] On the question of delay in particular, the Federal Court in Hong Leong Finance held that the courts in Malaysia have consistently required the applicant to furnish a reasonable explanation for the delay, and that the applicant must place before the court some material and advance some cogent reasons. A bare assertion carries no evidential value and discharges nothing. [19] These principles have been applied at first instance in terms directly relevant to the present case. In Mah Sing Properties Sdn Bhd v SG Prestige Sdn Bhd [2021] 8 MLJ 607 (HC), it was held that where the facts giving rise to the amendment were known at the time of the original pleading, and the application is nevertheless made late without a convincing explanation, the Court may properly infer that the application is connected with a tactical manoeuvre, a proposition drawn from, among other authorities, Lim Nyang Tak Michael v ACE Technologies Sdn Bhd [1995] 4 MLJ 616 and Ismail bin Ibrahim & Ors v Sum Poh Development Sdn Bhd & Anor [1988] 3 MLJ 348 (HC), as approved in Jupiter Securities Sdn Bhd v Wan Yaakub bin Abd Rahman [2002] 3 MLJ 264. In Astana Modal (M) Sdn Bhd v BS Testing Laboratory Sdn Bhd & Ors [2021] MLJU 132, applying Hong Leong Finance, it was held that prejudice incapable of compensation by costs may arise not merely from additional expense, but also from the disruption occasioned by a late amendment, including the burden of re-organising a defence and assembling further evidence for a more complicated trial. [20] It is against this legal framework, namely the wide but principled discretion conferred by Order 20 rule 5(1), informed by Yamaha Motor and, in cases involving a late amendment introducing a new case, further guided by the principles articulated in Hong Leong Finance, that the present application falls to be determined. E. ANALYSIS AND DETERMINATION Whether The Proposed Amendment Introduces A New Case [21] The first contention advanced for the amendment is that it introduces no new cause of action and no new facts, but merely particularises the relief flowing from matters already pleaded; and that relief which is alternative in nature, though different in kind, may properly be claimed where it arises from the same facts. Stated at that level of generality, the proposition is unobjectionable. The addition or substitution of a claim arising out of the same, or substantially the same, facts is contemplated by the very authorities relied upon; and, as Yamaha Motor itself recognises, an amendment may be allowed even where its effect is to add or substitute a new cause of action arising out of the same facts. [22] The inquiry, however, does not end with the observation that the facts are unchanged. The third of the Yamaha Motor questions is directed not to the facts but to the character of the suit. The claim as originally framed proceeds upon the footing that the agreement or the instalment plan is invalid or has been brought to an end, and seeks the return of monies as a consequence of that invalidity. The amendment proceeds upon the opposite premise: it affirms the transaction and seeks to enforce it in specie, by compelling transfer and the delivery of vacant possession of the Unit. A claim to undo a transaction and recover what was paid under it is, in its essential character, distinct from a claim to enforce that transaction and to obtain the very subject matter of the bargain. The amendment therefore does more than refine the relief sought; it introduces a claim of a different character. To that extent it engages both the third limb of Yamaha Motor and the stricter approach required by Hong Leong Finance for an amendment which introduces a new case on the eve of trial. Delay And The Onus To Explain [23] The application was filed approximately ten months after the Statement of Claim, more than three months after the case management of 21.11.2025, and two days before the deadline for pre-trial documents. The pleadings had been closed since September 2025, and the Court had, at two successive case managements, proceeded upon the footing that they were closed and that the matter was moving towards trial. By any measure, the application is a late one. It was filed after the close of pleadings, after two case managements had proceeded on the basis that the pleadings were closed, and only two days before the deadline fixed for the filing of pre-trial documents. In my judgment, it falls within the category of a late amendment contemplated in Hong Leong Finance. [24] Once that threshold is crossed, the onus lies upon the Plaintiff to furnish, on affidavit, a cogent and reasonable explanation for the delay. That onus has not been discharged. Neither the affidavit in support (Enclosure 19) nor the affidavit in reply (Enclosure 22) offers any explanation as to why the relief now sought was not claimed at the outset, or at any time before the eve of the deadline for pre-trial documents. The answer given to the complaint of delay is not an explanation of the delay at all; it is the different assertion that, because the application is made before trial and before any evidence has been recorded, no injustice can result. That is an argument directed to prejudice, not to the reason for the delay, and it leaves the heavy onus identified in Hong Leong Finance unanswered. As that case makes plain, a bare assertion carries no evidential value; and the absence of any reason, where the point was available from the beginning, is precisely the want of explanation which the Federal Court held to be material. Whether The Facts Were Within The Plaintiff's Knowledge [25] It is common ground that the proposed amendment introduces no new facts. The matters upon which the amended relief depends, namely the payments made by the Plaintiff and the alleged withholding of vacant possession, were already pleaded in the original Statement of Claim and were within the Plaintiff's knowledge when the action was commenced in April 2025. The relief now sought could therefore have been claimed from the outset. Where the relevant facts were known from the beginning, and the application to amend is nevertheless made late and without explanation, the Court may properly infer, consistently with Mah Sing Properties, that the lateness is connected with some tactical advantage rather than any genuine impediment to an earlier amendment. The Plaintiff has placed nothing before the Court to displace that inference. Prejudice And Whether It Is Compensable By Costs [26] It was next urged that any prejudice is curable by costs, since the Defendant retains liberty to amend its Defence and Counterclaim and the trial has not begun. That submission understates the nature of the prejudice. As Hong Leong Finance makes clear, lateness cannot necessarily be compensated by an award of costs; and as Astana Modal explains, the prejudice arising from a late amendment lies not merely in additional expense, but in the disruption to a defence already prepared and structured upon the case as originally pleaded. To meet a claim that the transaction be enforced in specie, as opposed to one seeking the recovery of monies, may require the Defendant to reconsider its pleaded position, revisit its evidence, and prepare for a trial involving different issues and potentially additional evidence, at the very point when pre-trial documents were due. That the Defendant may itself have to amend its Defence and Counterclaim is not an answer to the prejudice; it is itself an aspect of that prejudice. [27] I accept that the application is made before the recording of any evidence, and that this is a factor in the Plaintiff's favour. But the absence of recorded evidence does not answer the want of explanation for the delay, nor does it neutralise the disruption to trial preparation occasioned by a change in the character of the relief at this stage. The factor is real, but in the circumstances it is not decisive. The Contention Of Contradictory Reliefs [28] A further objection is that the amended reliefs are contradictory and mutually destructive, in that the Plaintiff cannot at once disavow the agreement and enforce the proprietary and contractual benefits arising under it, and that to obtain both the Unit and the return of all monies paid would unjustly enrich her. There is a measure of force in the observation, but I do not rest my decision upon it. A party is not precluded from pleading inconsistent or alternative claims; and the relief in specie is expressly sought "subject to an account", a qualification directed at preventing the very windfall of which complaint is made. Whether the reliefs are ultimately reconcilable is a question that would fall to be determined at trial, and need not be resolved upon an application of this nature. The application fails for the reasons already given, and it is unnecessary to decide this further question. The Authorities Relied Upon In Support Of The Amendment [29] It is right to record that the two authorities placed before the Court in support of the application do not, on examination, assist the Plaintiff. Both recognise the liberal approach to amendments; but in both, leave to amend was ultimately refused. In Lam Chee Seong & Anor v Chan Man Chung & Ors [2026] MLRHU 461 (HC), the application was made after the action had been on foot for some years, after pleadings were complete, after a trial date had been fixed, and shortly before trial. The Court classified the amendment as substantive rather than cosmetic, found the explanation offered, namely a change of solicitors, insufficient, and held that the balance of justice favoured refusal. In MBf Capital Bhd & Anor v Tommy Thomas & Anor (No 10) [1998] 3 MLRH 730 (HC), the application was made six days before trial, the facts were within the applicant's knowledge well beforehand, no explanation for the delay was given, and the Court declined to be satisfied of the applicant's bona fides. The parallels with the present application are evident, and these authorities tend, if anything, to support the conclusion that leave should be refused. [30] For completeness, I record that certain averments contained in the Defendant's written material refer to a "Petitioner" and to "Respondents", and to complaints of a kind not raised on these pleadings. Those averments do not correspond to the parties or to the issues in this action, and I have left them out of account. The Balance Of Justice [31] Drawing these matters together, the position is as follows. The amendment introduces a claim of a different character; it is sought on the eve of trial, after the pleadings have long been closed; it rests upon facts known from the inception of the action; no cogent explanation for the delay has been advanced on affidavit; and the prejudice to the Defendant is not, in the circumstances, one which an order for costs would adequately answer. The single factor in the Plaintiff's favour that no evidence has yet been recorded is insufficient to outweigh these considerations. Applying the discipline which Hong Leong Finance requires of a court faced with a late amendment of this kind, the balance of justice falls against the grant of leave. F. CONCLUSION [32] The discretion under Order 20 rule 5(1) is to be exercised judicially, in accordance with the principles in Yamaha Motor and, for a late amendment introducing a new case, those in Hong Leong Finance. The onus which those principles place upon an applicant who seeks to amend late, upon facts long known, has not been met. It follows that the application cannot succeed. G. ORDERS OF THE COURT [33] Accordingly, I make the following orders: