KUALA LUMPUR: Penang residents blame hillslope development projects for the terrible flood which struck the state recently.
Persatuan Anak Jati Penang representative Liew Yeow Hooi expressed his disappointment at the state government for allowing the development projects to take place.
“Due to the development, the flood had worsened. The colour of the flood water in Georgetown is yellow and where did it come from?
“From all the leveled hills and trees cut down resulting in the lack of rain catchment areas,” he said in a three-minute video which had gone viral.
Malaysian United Party (MUP) women’s affairs bureau chairman Tan Sim Bee said in the video said the people of Penang are still traumatised by the Tanjung Bungah landslide on October 21 which killed 11 workers.
“From this latest disaster (floods), seven were killed totaling the number of victims to 18 caused by the hillslope development, all in less than a month. When will this end?
“All the residue from this flood water would be deposited into drains, clogging it, resulting in another flood when the next rain comes to Penang,” she said.
Affected by the flood, Agabaram Kanee said he had never experienced such flood that took place in Penang.
“As someone who had lived most of his life here, there had never been a flood that actually caused so much destruction and pain to the people here.
“The state government sold lands to the developers to build new housing areas on the hillslope and because of that, the water channeling system wasn’t built correctly, clogging up of drains and leveled hills,” he said.
Another victim known only as Suphian demanded a guarantee from the state government to solve the problem.
“Whenever we ask them to resolve this issue they would answer that they don’t have the power to solve this. What kind of power do they want? They are the state government and they can very well come up with a solution for this problem.
“They need to stop thinking like an opposition party. They are the state government but with this recent disaster, it’s proven that they can’t be in administration,” he said.
Almost the whole of Penang was hit by floods and scores of trees uprooted in a more than 15 hours of rain which begat at 2pm on November 4.