Penang CM: Developer has one week to solve Tanjung Bungah homebuyers’ woes

PENANG (Oct 27): Penang chief minister Lim Guan Eng has given the developer of the Tanjung Bungah hillside housing project, which was hit by a deadly landslide last Saturday, one week to reach an amicable solution with those who bought properties in the development, the malaysiakini news portal reported today.

“Fail to do so within the timeframe [and] we will intervene, as we are always on the buyers' side,” he told the media yesterday.

Lim also said that he hoped the Penang Commission of Inquiry set up to investigate the landslide would uncover the cause and penalise the people responsible, Bernama reported yesterday.

He added that the Penang City Council (MBPP) had also lodged a police report on the incident.

“We leave it to the police as well as any other parties including the Department of Occupational Safety and Health (DOSH) to conduct an investigation and endorse the incident as an accident at a construction site,” Bernama reported him as saying.

Bernama also reported that MBPP mayor Datuk Maimunah Mohd Sharif said the Department of Urban and Rural Planning had no objections to the project development in the area.

She revealed that in a letter dated Dec 11, 2014, the department said in principle it had no objections to any application for permit to build a 53-storey block of affordable flats comprising two 38-storey towers, a 12-storey parking lot podium and a single-storey community facility at Lot 4510, Mukim 18, Lorong Lembah Permai 3, Tanjung Bungah, Bernama reported.

Meanwhile, the Malaysian Institute of Planners (MIP) said the construction industry system and processes should be reviewed on the basis of responsibility and accountability of various parties, instead of the expediting of approvals.

“MIP strongly thinks that the existing policies and guidelines for developments on hill slopes/hill sites need to be reviewed immediately, to address the crucial issues of Disaster Risk Reduction. We need to move forward and find ways to reduce the possibility of recurrence of this tragedy,” said its president Ihsan Zainal Mokhtar.