Thursday, March 12, 2009

RM528mil Flood Mitigation Project Undone

Kuala Lumpur mayor Datuk Ahmad Fuad was quoted saying that the independent contractor, who was awarded the RM528mil flood mitigation project to build retention ponds at Jinjang and Batu, had failed to complete the project on time in May 2007 and the delay was one of the main reasons for the March 3 flooding that caused chaos in the city. However, Fuad said he would leave it to the Federal Territories Ministry to decide on the fate of the independent contractor. This is another classic case of letting the unscrupulous off the hook by the authority with no reasonable explanation while the people are left to suffer heavy losses resulting from floods. Can the floods victims sue the authority? The answer is no after the Federal Court's decision in MPAJ v. Steven Phoa Cheng Loon & Ors. whereby the Federal Court held that the authority is granted immunity from liability for such consequences under S. 95(2) of the Street, Drainage & Building Act 1974. Can the victims sue the independent contractor instead? My answer is yes if and only if city hall is cooperative enough by giving full disclosure of the content of the contract and testifying in court against the contractor.
Lim Lip Eng

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Mr. Lim,

Actually,the contractor who is responsible fo this project has been classified as a PN17 financial trouble on KLSE resulting in delaying the completion of the project.Without sufficient fund the project is impossible to be complete. Positive measure shall be taken immediately otherwise kl will be hit by another flood and flood and flood................

Anonymous said...

YB,

Part of the recent flooding has to do with UMNO wanted to make PTWC looks natural with cascading fall in Sg Gombak. FT JPS cannot say anything about UMNO dumping all the big boulders into the river beside PTWC. That is why MIC building is susceptible to flooding and also the effect on upstream due to backwater effect - raising the water level.

Please take a tour with FT Minister and the Mayor. Ask why and is there any APPROVAL for dumping rocks into the River?