Today's (14 March 2009) Star paper reported that a total of 125 flash-flood victims in Taman Mutiara in Senai have filed for damages totaling RM 2.79 million against a construction company, a municipal council and the Government. This reminds me of a flood incident in 1995.
One day in 1995 I received a call from home in Penang informing me that my mum , already 70 , woke up and came down from upstairs around 6 o'clock in the morning and as she stepped down from the last step, not knowing that the house was flooded due to the heavy rain in the early morning, she immediately slipped and fell down. Thank God my mum was physically still strong and she did not suffer any injury.
My house had never been flooded since we moved in this neighbourhood in 1964 and the area had already been developed. Therefore no significant change of landuse that could have caused the flood to occur. I decided to make a trip home to investigate the drainage system. I walked along the drain starting from my mum's house going downstream. As I walked I looked out for any visible blockage of the drain. When I reached the outlet of the drain near the sea, to my horror a concrete wall was constructed across the drain. There was a multi-storey building under construction just beside the drain at this location. I got the culprit of the flood. I called up the engineer in charge in the penang municipal council . We knew each other when I was serving in Penang from 1986 to 1993. After some exchange of opinion regarding the matter, he explained that the developer wanted to construct a temporary wall to prevent his work being affected by high tide. We both knew that this wall had caused the backup of flow in the drain causing the flood in the upstream area and this was also not the way to solve the problem facing by this developer. Without offering any excuses, the council engineer assured me that he would instruct the developer to remove the concrete wall immediately.
The irresponsible,indifferent and sometimes ignorant, attitude of the parties concerned in the construction industry in this country have very often caused some of the floods that have occurred so frequently. It is high time the flood victims know their rights and with the expertise of lawyer and the drainage /flood mitigation engineer, the relevant parties shall be taken to task. Hopefully this will bring about the change in all parties involved in the construction industry to be more responsible and caring.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment