 The present area of Johor Bahru was originally known as Tanjung Puteri , and was a fishing village of the Malays located near Singapore . Temenggong Daeng Ibrahim then renamed Tanjung Puteri to Iskandar Puteri once he arrived in the area in 1858 after acquiring the territory from Sultan Ali ; before it was renamed Johor Bahru by Sultan Abu Bakar following the Temenggong 's death . ( The suffix " Bahru " means " new " in Malay , normally written " baru " in standard spelling today but appearing with several variants in place names , such as Kota Bharu and Indonesian Pekanbaru . ) The British preferred to spell its name as Johore Bahru or Johore Bharu , but the current accepted western spelling is Johor Bahru , as Johore is only spelt Johor ( without the letter " e " at the end of the word ) in Malay language . The city is currently spelled as Johor Baru or Johor <unk> . 
