Halt hillslope projects and focus on floods, state told
KUALA LUMPUR: All hill slope projects in Penang should be stopped and top priority given to flood mitigation instead, said Natural Resources and Environment Minister Datuk Seri Dr Wan Junaidi Tuanku Jaafar.
“For hill slope projects I ask, please don’t carry it out, because we saw a landslide in Tanjung Bungah. Luckily the houses were not occupied, as no Certificate of Fitness had been issued,” Wan Junaidi said after visiting the National Flood Forecasting Centre here.
Dr Wan Junaidi said the Penang floods happened because of unexpectedly high rainfall, made worse by the spring tide phenomenon which causes unusually high tides.
He said the flood mitigation systems needed there was different from other states because Penang is made up of an island and mainland Seberang Perai.
Dr Wan Junaidi pointed out that Kedah also received very heavy rains on Nov 4 and 5, but some of the excess water was absorbed by its forests or channelled to rivers.
Dr Wan Junaidi said his ministry would study the possibility of building aqueducts and barrages supported by storm-water storage systems for Penang.
“The cost is high, so in the meantime the Penang government must play a big role to (properly) prioritise development in the state ... and address the question of floods first.
“If we have cut down our forests and hills, it will reduce the areas’ water absorption capacity when it rains,” he said.
In a written response to Penang Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng in Parliament, the Natural Resources and Environment (NRE) Ministry said the Federal Government had spent RM1.04bil for flood mitigation projects in Penang from 2006 to 2016.
Meanwhile the Institute of Engineers Malaysia (IEM) in a statement said a comprehensive and integrated flood mitigation masterplan is needed to cater for development planning in Penang and Kedah.
IEM president Dr Tan Yean Chin said the proposed masterplan should include prevention action plans, for current and future developments, changes in use of land as well as climate change factors.
“Non-structural measures are also important to improve flood forecasting and warning systems for all major river basins, relocation of people from flood-prone areas and land use control,” he said.
Dr Tan pointed out that many locations in Malaysia were experiencing extraordinarily heavy rainfall and many had also exceeded the 100-year Average Recurrence Interval (ARI).
Examples include the Johor floods in 2006 and in Kelantan, Terengganu and Pahang in 2014.