KL residents have mixed feelings over PH’s performance

The 60 years that Barisan Nasional was in power, among others, saw the end to local council elections.

This, in turn, saw the birth of the Federal Territories Ministry.

It was something that many stakeholders, especially in the federal capital, found unappealing.

As such, when one of Pakatan Harapan’s (PH) pledge in the 14th General Election (GE14) was to hold local government elections, it found solid support.

While Housing and Local Government Minister Zuraida Kamaruddin is scheduled to propose a model for local authority polls by 2021, most people, however, are sceptical as the decision ultimately rests with the cabinet.

Months ago, Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad had shot down the possibility of instituting local government elections citing it could cause racial conflicts, among others.

However, like most city folk, former Wangsa Maju federal lawmaker, Datuk Seri Tan Kee Kwong, believed PH should implement it.

“The Kuala Lumpur City Hall’s advisory board’s system, for instance, doesn’t make it answerable for the decisions it makes. So the people need to elect mayors and councillors to govern their councils,” said the PKR politician.

Brickfields Rukun Tetangga chairman S.K.K. Naidu said local polls were crucial for the running of any local authority.

He cited the rocky start of Khalid Abdul Samad, when he began his tenure a Federal Territories minister.

“I can’t give him a good rating,

because nothing in Kuala Lumpur City Hall has changed. It refuses to consult us, and (instead) builds things as it likes.

“It only refers to us when something goes viral,” he told the New Straits Times.

Naidu said when the pact first came into power, a proposal was submitted to City Hall by the Malaysian Association of the Blind to retrofit a walkway before the River of Life upgrading work began near the organisation’s facility.

“But City Hall ignored us and went ahead (with its original plan). After we made noise they are now retrofitting it. And this was done when we secured Khalid for a meeting three months ago.

“So how is it different from the FT ministry under BN? I can give another 10 examples as to where money was thrown away after bad decisions were taken in Brickfields. The worst part is that as a constituent I cannot vote Khalid out as he is Shah Alam member of parliament.”

He said Kuala Lumpur folk might have to engage the prime minister in petty matters due to City Hall’s lack of engagement.

He said Khalid and his ministry narrowly passed their one year review as they inherited issues from the previous government.

He added that the problems faced by PH here included a lack of engagement by City Hall with stakeholders, dubious land deals, lack of transparency in planning and botched building construction and upgrading works.

Naidu said after a year in power PH could no longer fall back on BN’s wrongdoings as a crutch.

Political and economic analyst Dr Hoo Ke Ping, however, was all praise for Khalid.

Hoo congratulated him for saving almost half a billion ringgit of City Hall money since PH came to power.

Khalid had said the money was saved through reviews on 97 land transactions here, which boosted City Hall’s income by RM481 million.

However, he said: “Khalid must open the books and show us the numbers and the land price.”

Malaysian Youth Council president Jufitri Joha commended Khalid for building dormitories along Jalan Tuanku Abdul Rahman for youths to stay.

He said having City Hall take over the Go KL bus service and deploying it to People’s Housing Programme residential areas would help the people.