FOR the past 30 years, in the course of my reporting with various newspapers, I have been dealing with local councils and city halls.
Because I was mainly covering areas under the Kuala Lumpur City Hall (DBKL), Selayang Municipal Council (MPS) and the then Petaling Jaya Municipal Council (now MBPJ), I have to say DBKL and MPS are the two worst local councils when it comes to providing quality services. MBPJ, by comparison, is a lot better.
This is because, despite a change of the state government, little is done to solve the problem at the local government level.
Apart from some cosmetic changes to the websites, I have seen little — in fact, no improvement — to one particular local council, with which I have had to deal with often.
MPS has never been any better than what it was 25 years ago. If I have a rating of 0-10 to give, I would place it at the lower end of perhaps one, if not zero.
Former officers who were in my opinion non-performers were promoted to the position of directors, but quality of service remained poor.
Whether in the past or presently, complaints to the local council are hardly solved; instead, the responses one receives are pretty standard: there is either no more budget left for the year or an investigation will be carried out. This often ends with nothing being done.
As a result tree stumps are left abandoned there for over 20 years. A good example is a tree stump in Taman Ehsan that has been there for at least 20 years, time when I was still writing for the old Malay Mail.
Therefore, I am not surprised that another fallen tree which has damaged a railing at Persiaran KIP 2 in Wangsa Permai recently, for example, will remain there for another 20 years.
The construction of a drainage system at Jalan Aman has taken several months to complete, and until today, the job is still not done.
This is in fact, not the first time the council had tried to solve the flash flood problem. Construction of inferior drainage done less than two years ago had to be reconstructed and this is wasting huge public funds.
It is perhaps time for the National Anti-Financial Crime Centre (NAFCC) to look into any possible financial irregularities in the way how the local councils manage the public funds.
Numerous other complaints have been raised to the attention of the President of the Local Council, Shamsul Shahril Badliza b. Mohd Noor in the past few months have been ignored.
When raised further to the attention of the current Menteri Besar, Amiruddin Shari the response has also been very poor. There is no difference with his predecessor, Azmin Ali when the latter was Menteri Besar.
Selangorians have had enough of the politicking. It is time that the state government under the current leadership deliver, or else, they should be replaced permanently with the right people. – Feb 1, 2021
Stephen Ng
Kuala Lumpur
The views expressed are solely of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Focus Malaysia.
