On Saturday, Malaysia held a national-level celebration of the World Rivers Day in Johor Baru's Sungai Tebrau, the river which has often been the site of punishing pollution.
Perhaps we would have a reason to celebrate if Sungai Tebrau is the only river to be polluted. The sad truth is almost all the rivers in Malaysia are.
The recent chemical pollution in Johor is but a small slice of a national problem. Unsurprisingly, dumping chemicals, oils garbage and the like has become a thriving business that rogue lorry owners are willing to dump anything into a river for a price.
Why is this continuing to happen is a question we have not addressed exhaustively. Lawmakers often rush to amend laws, thinking this to be a pollution-stopper. Lawyers tell us laws aren't the problem. To them, the problem is one of enforcement of existing laws.
We sometimes blame the courts for not imposing the maximum of penalties. They are the wrong targets, we say. The fault lies with the regulators for not making the case to the courts.
Let's not forget the laws, in most instances, give the courts discretion which they exercise based on the evidence presented. What could courts do to curb river pollution if regulators only charge rogue lorry drivers? Why not also the operators of factories, workshops, mines and agricultural land? Trace the industrial effluent to the owners and you will find the real river rogues. They must not be allowed to buy their way out.
Regulators also fail at an earlier stage when a factory or industrial premises is just an idea for approval. Granted, there are plenty of illegal industrial premises dotting the length and breadth of the country. Again, this is a shocking failure of enforcement.
Pollution is best tackled at this early stage. Why allow such industrial premises to be located in river basins? Despite experts calling on the authorities not to locate high-risk industrial premises there and upstream, such calls go unheeded. This is an open invitation for frequent closure of water treatment plants, whose occurrence has reached tiresome levels.
Our water utilities are in such a miserable state because regulators provide breeding grounds for environmental predators. Talk of zero cost of doing dirty business. Pollution can be curbed, but not by just seeing it as a problem to be cured.
Yes, we can clean them up at great cost to people's health and to the coffers of the government. The illegal dumping of industrial chemicals into Sungai Kim Kim in Pasir Gudang, Johor, in March 2019 was an alarming example.
More than 3,000 people were treated for exposure to hazardous chemical fumes, not to mention the long term impact on their health. Not to mention, too, the closure of hundreds of schools. The cost to the government? An estimated RM7 million to clean up just the 1.5km stretch of Sungai Kim Kim.
A better way is to prevent pollution from happening. This doesn't mean there is no need for disaster management. The more attention we give to pollution prevention, the less costly disaster management will become. Only then celebrating World Rivers Day would have any meaning.