MBPJ forks out RM210,000 for guard post

And this is only one of the many exorbitant sums in the Council’s Budget 2010 pamphlet made available to FMT by a concerned citizen.

By B. Nantha Kumar, Free Malaysia Today

PETALING JAYA: How much does it cost to construct a 18ft x 20ft guard post? According to contractors, it will cost about RM25,000 and that too with an attached toilet.

But this was not the price the Petaling Jaya City Council (MBPJ) paid its selected contractor for the job.

MBPJ forked out a whopping RM210,000 for the guard post, nearly 10 times higher than that quoted by contractors. This figure was stated in a pamphlet made available to FMT, containing details of the MBPJ’s 2010 Budget.

According to the pamphlet, MBPJ allocated a whopping RM260.44 million to administer Petaling Jaya. It also revealed the development expenditure for Petaling Jaya and areas that fell under it.

The pamphlet listed over 30 development plans for last year and apart from the guard post, there were also other questionable figures such as RM1million allocated for light upgrading of roads in the city, construction of a futsal court at D’Kelana for RM350,000, upgrading of street lights for RM1 million, upgrading of a hockey stadium for RM2.2 million, construction of an access road to the Vista Subang low-cost apartment for RM1 million and the construction of a road at PJS2/1 for RM1.4 million.

MBPJ also allocated RM100,000 for Taman Jaya and another RM685,000 for Taman Aman. But no details of the projects in these two areas were specified in the pamphlet.

The council was also spending RM500,000 for the construction of a car park and a nursery under the high tension cable in Taman Jaya.

It also spent RM1.1 million for neighbourhood development and kids park construction, RM1.65 million to upgrade open spaces, RM525,000 for landscape beautification, RM800,000 for the upgrading of football fields, RM150,000 for a car park area at section 51A/219, RM200,000 for treatment of municipal water at Tasik Bandaran, RM500,000 for the installation of street lights, RM1 million for road transport research, RM2 million for upgrading the drainage system and RM1 million to upgrade back lanes.

The council had also used RM350,000 to upgrade pedestrian walkways, RM500,000 for the renovation of the Civic Centre, RM600,000 for the construction of the mayor’s residence, RM310,000 to upgrade the Petaling Jaya museum, RM125,000 to upgrade MBPJ nurseries, RM500,000 to upgrade multipurpose halls, RM200,000 for the development of UHF RFID facilities at community libraries and RM250,000 for its key performance index activities.

FMT could not verify all the projects listed in the MBPJ pamphlet due to lack of details but managed to check three projects, namely the construction of the futsal court at D’Kelana, the Vista Subang access road and the construction of another road at PJS2/1.

‘Most expensive futsal court in the country?’

It was revealed that the construction of the futsal court was not according to plan as it was built outside the D’Kelana community hall rather than inside.

A contractor told FMT that the RM350,000 price tag for the open air futsal court must be the highest quotation in the country.

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