Saturday, March 8, 2014

‘Liow wrong, Syabas to blame’

Selangor Menteri Besar Incorporated chief executive officer Faekah Husin said that the current water crisis was not caused by the Pakatan Rakyat-led Selangor government, as claimed by MCA president Liow Tiong Lai.

“It was Syabas’ failure to plug on to the 34% of non renewable water that caused the problem,” said Faekah at the sidelines of Selangor MB Khalid Ibrahim’s meet the people function in Desa Sri Jenaris.

“There is a management crisis in Syabas and the water service industry in the state. Bringing in the water from elsewhere would not resolve the problem.

“That is why the Selangor government moved to take over the state’s water management,” said Faekah who was Khalid Ibrahim’s former political secretary.

Yesterday, MCA president Liow Tiong Lai accused the Selangor state government for the water crisis.

He said that the Cabinet had warned in 2008 that a delay in constructing the Langat 2 Water Treatment Plant would result in water crisis as early as 2014.

“We are in 2014, and the water problem has begun. When 2.2 million people were suffering, only then did the Selangor government agree to build the plant.

“We wasted six years because someone wants to play politics on the water issue,” he said after chairing the MCA presidential council meeting yesterday.

The Federal government had previously pressed the state to allow them to start a RM8.65 million raw water transfer project from Pahang to Selangor as well as to construct the Langat 2 plant.

The Selangor government shunned the calls and asked the Federal government to give them the green light to take over the state’s four water concessionaires, claiming that the concession agreements were lopsided.

The intensive horse-trading came to an end last Wednesday when both parties finally agreed to give in to their respective demands and signed a MoU to resolve the water woes.

Khalid was criticised by PKR supremo Anwar Ibrahim, strategy director Rafizi Ramli who is also Pandan MP and deputy president Azmin Ali who is also Selangor Backbenchers Club chief over the MoU.--FreeMalaysiaToday

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