Mahadzir should retract his words or quit

 

Is Mahdzir trying to tell us that oil spillages had never occurred before which causes the treatment plants to be shut down? 

Stephen Ng, FMT letter

I cannot help but to lash out at Deputy Minister of Energy, Green Technology and Water, Mahdzir Khalid when he started playing up the issue of Langat 2 dam again like an old record.

What has Langat 2 dam to do with the oil spillage in the first place? I thought Selangor Menteri Besar, Khalid Ibrahim had said that it was necessary but priority had to be placed on reducing the non-revenue water (NRW), currently at 33%!

Is Mahdzir trying to tell us that oil spillages had never occurred before which causes the treatment plants to be shut down? The oil spillage that occurred on Friday was not as though it was a big crisis as the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, that it had to take nearly three months from April to July 2010 to clean up.

The oil spillage in the case of Sungai Selangor, which occurred some 10km upstream, was arrested within 12 hours.

In the first place, the oil spillage was not as what he had claimed. He had said in Bernama that the spillage was due to an overturned diesel truck. Mahdzir, please show us evidence of the overturned truck and where and when that happened.

According to State Exco for Tourism, Consumer Affairs and Environment, Elizabeth Wong, the oil spillage had been identified coming from an illegal factory in Rawang, not from an overturned diesel truck as claimed by Mahdzir.

Even Natural Resources and Environment Minister G Palanivel had confirmed that the oil spill was due to a factory dumping lubricating oil (SW 305) into a drain, which went into Sungai Gong, and a significant amount subsequently flowed into Sungai Selangor, forcing the closure of the four water treatment plants.

Under such circumstances, the Federal Department of Environment has the power to prosecute the illegal factory under the Environmental Quality Act 1974 (Act 127) 25(3):

Any person who contravenes subsection (1) shall be guilty of an offence and shall be liable to a fine not exceeding one hundred thousand ringgit or to imprisonment for a period not exceeding five years or to both and to a further fine not exceeding one thousand ringgit a day for every day that the offence is continued after a notice by the Director General requiring him to cease the act specified therein has been served upon him

In the past, when oil spillages happened, water could be restored within a short period of time, but what is happening these days to Syabas? Is it incapable of putting the water supply back to normal? Why does it have to take three to five days for Syabas to restore the supply of water to over five million people in the Klang Valley?

Water happens to come under Mahdzir’s ministry. Failure to restore water supply at the earliest possible time frame is a reflection of his ministry’s own failure, and Mahdzir should resign over the statements that he made which did not augur well with his ministry’s role to safeguard the people’s interest.

As a customer of Syabas, I find it hard to believe that water cannot be restored within the shortest period possible, if not immediately. Water is a basic need, and there is no excuse for Syabas not to buck up! If anything, its chief executive officer who is receiving salaries in the millions of ringgit should be sacked for Syabas’ failure to perform, and the entire corporation should be handed back to the Selangor State Government.

Any form of sabotage would only anger the people of Selangor, and for this, I would suggest that Mahdzir thinks twice of what he has to say. We are watching to see who is doing the job, and who is just shooting out of his mouth. Mahdzir should retract his words, or he is not fit for his post.