Reflections

long time i did not made a post here but of course had been blogging at my own personal blog all the time. well since i’m quite passionate on the orang asli issue, i’m going to CnP what i wrote about the orang asli here.

this is my first post, where i copy the article from malaysiakini, including many pictures too. of course i only paste my own say here.

—–

the march of the real bumiputera…

or supposed to be a march… because they were stopped by the police!… while the pendatang from perkasa and those pendatang cow-head protestors marched/protest, the police did nothing.

Read the rest of this entry »

On Deepavali Day, 17 October 2009, residents of Pearl Hill Townhouse and Solok Tan Jit Seng in Tanjung Bungah, Penang, organised a protest against dangerous hill slopes development, which they labelled as ‘Deepavali Tea Party’, because the protest was followed by a tea reception.

About 60 residents turned up, supported by the Tanjung Bungah Residents Association (TBRA). They all hold banners and placards with catchy slogans like ‘Hell on earth with Hill Slopes Development’, ‘Mistakes cost lives’.  However, what was more interesting was that some of them were armed with pots and pans, which they will bang hard, making a noisy din, each time a speaker made a pertinent point.

This was the third ‘Tea Party’ in this year, organised by the Tanjung Bungah residents. The first one was on Valentine’s Day, 14 Feb at Chee Seng Gardens, and the second one was at Solok Tan Jit Seng on 23 March.

In the recent Deepavali Tea Party, the residents hope that the State Government will adhere strictly to the newly Cabinet-approved ‘Guidelines for Hillside and Highland Areas Development’ (12/8/09).  which bans any development on slopes of more than 35 degrees gradient.

They also urged the State Government to stop projects at high risk areas. By ‘high-risk area’ it mean by building on hill slopes above 25 degrees, as stipulated by the Science & Environment Ministry Guidelines on Hill Slope Development issued out in 2002. They call it Class III (above 25 degrees) & Class IV (above 35 degrees). Class IV is deemed VERY Dangerous to construct any building

Ironically at Solok Tan Jit Seng, developer DynamicPro plans to build 25 three-storey town-houses on a hill-slope which residents claim has a gradient of over 65 degrees! So much more than the stipulated Class IV. The project site on the slope looks down on a row of houses, behind which stands the Tanjung Bunga school. Above the project site on the slope lies the precariously perched Pearl Hill apartments

That’s why on Deepavali Day, the residents of Pearl Hill and Solok Tan Jit Sent decided to organised a  protest, hoping their voices would be heard. With the tragedy of Bukit Antarabangsa fresh in their mind, they fear for their lives

Desmond Ling, the chairman of the Pearl Hill Phase I Residents Association was the MC and the first speaker, followed by Datuk Phang, a resident of Solok Tan Jit Seng, who spoke in Mandarin.

George Aeria, TBRA chairperson was the third speaker. Both he and Desmond were passionate in voicing that the situations in their areas are now very risky and dangerous and they want the government to do something about it.

“Our tea party will go on and on until the State Government do something” said George, “We are here for a simple reason – to urge the government to stop dangerous hill slopes development.”

George also informed that there will be a state hearing on appeal against Pearl Hill, Tanjung Bungah’s hill slopes development at Komtar.

Both were glad that they had the support of YB Teh Yee Cheu, the DAP state assembly member for Tanjung Bunga. YB Teh was the last speaker to address the crowd.  At an interview, YB Teh said that although it looks like he alone is supporting the Tanjung Bunga residents, on the contrary, the government did do something.

”Last year, we did put a stop to Class III and Class IV hill slopes development when we stop granting approval to developers.” Said YB Teh.

Pressed on what about the existing Class III and Class IV projects, he responded that the people could play a part here for example by appealing to the Board to stop these projects or scaling down the projects.

As to what will convince the people that they (government) are doing something, he said that the government will try to have more dialogue with the residents.

Vice chairperson  of TBRA, Lee Lainne, spoke on the ambiguity of the Penang Structure Plan which omitted the gazetted boundary of Tanjong Bunga from the designated ‘Secondary Development Corridor’.  This means the gazetted boundary of Tanjung BUnga is now listed as Primary Corridor.

“The infrastructure of Tanjung Bunga is such that it does not cater for the First Primary Corridor,” explained Lee, “Primary Corridor permits high density development, which is suitable for George Town but certainly not Tanjung Bunga.”

She said that the government should concentrate on building up a good infrastructure for Tanjung Bunga before putting it under the Primary Corridor.

In a press statement released on the day of the protest, the residents stated that since Sept. 2008, they had been in dialogue with the City Council and the State Government, calling upon them to emulate the Selangor State Government, which has put a blanket ban on all Class III and Class IV hill slopes development. However, they were disheartened that despite their efforts to engage in dialogue, nothing has changed. Stop-work orders have come and gone and many risky developments have continued with only minor disruptions. There is still no blanket restriction on high-risk Hill Slopes development except for a verbal promise by Chief Minister, YAB Lim Guan Eng, at a meeting on 24 Dec. 2008.

They also stated that in the light of the danger posed by any hill slope development of 25 degrees and above, AND also because there is currently no competent and independent authority in Penang, ensuring ANY slope maintenance after the completion of a development, continued construction works on Class III and Class IV hill slopes is considered a serious threat to nearby residents. AT this, they called upon the State Government to:

• Put an immediate and permanent stop to all projects which have not been started on Class II and Class IV hill slope gradients.
• Rehabiliatge the presently denuded steep slopes which potentially threaten the lives and property of all residents living above and below such slopes.
• End any further approvals of development projects on Class III and Class IV Hill Slopes, as stiupulated in the guidelines issued by the Housing & Local Government Minister dated 12 Aug. 2009.
• Realise that it has a very important role to play to safeguard the lives and property of  the citizens of Penang and to demonstrate its commitment in writing and take above firm and drastic actions.

See the video here. (malaysiakini)

or at youtube

The eLawyer – Exabytes Penang Bloggers & Law Forum 2009 held on 28 june at USM see about 50 people in attendance. Citizen Journalists Natasja, Lilian Tan and Lim were there. Met a number of my blogger friends there like Richard Loh, Romerz, Masterwordsmith. Daniel. Chandra from Bangasa Malaysia Penang (Richard is also a Bangsa Malaysia Penang member) came late, just as the last speaker finished speaking. The last speaker was Mr Stephen Tan Ban Cheng, a journalist turned lawyer. I met him before twice at our Bangsa Malaysia Penang meeting (more than a year ago! and I was pleasantly surprised he can recognise me, even remember my name.

At the registration desk, manned by Exabytes staff, we received a nice orange ‘recycling’ bag,’ which contain a pen, a notebook, 2 desk calendars and of course Exabytes pamphlet announcing its latest promotion.

Read the rest of this entry »

attended the ‘right to information’ forum at the caring society complex, penang, yesterday. about 30 people were in attendance. it was organised by transparency international malaysia (TI) and centre for independent journalism. (CIJ)

usha from transparency international was at the registration desk. on registration, we were given some pamphlets and this cute badge, as seen in the picture here.

the moment i saw the badge with the words ‘journos’ on it, i think of my fellow citizen journalists (CJ) comrades. (a group of us who were trained by malaysiakini to be citizen/video journalists). some of them had already been ‘on the job’ going around as citizen journalists interviewing people and making videos. as i thought each of us only get one badge, i ask usha if the badges are on sale as i thought of getting some for the penang CJ. usha said not on sale but was kind enough to give me more of the badges. well i hope the CJ will like it.

the forum, or rather the ‘dialogue on citizen’s rights to access public information’ as stated on the banner, carried the theme ‘transparency of information for government with integrity’. i could not really understand the theme at first but after the dialogue, i was very clear of the theme and fully agree with it.

Read the rest of this entry »

damn! can’t seems to upload video in this blog. ok lah, so please go to my mental jog blog to see the video.

these videos are in reference to my earlier post on the hill-slopes development protest.

this is my second third project as a citizen/video journalist. the first was during pakatan’s 1st anniversary gathering at the esplanade on 7 march, where 4 of us, lilian, lim and leow were there; second one on 14 march when 5 of us (the same 4 L’s, plust koh) were out on the streets after 11.00am to interview the homeless people. yesterday, there were only 2 of us, lim and i where we went to the tanjung bungah residents association (TBRA) ‘tea party’  hill-slopes protest.

it was actually a ‘coffee party’ as coffee was served instead. this was the 2nd protest the TBRA held. the first one was in feb where they used pots and pans to bang. this coffee party protest was held at solok tan jit seng (behind the tg bungah secondary school) because it was where the dangerous hill-slopes project can be seen. seemed that over 20 trees had been cut down for the project and the hill-slope has a gradient of 68 degrees!

TBRA members wants the penang government to ban class 3 (a gradient of 25 – 35%) and class 4 (a gradient of over 35%) it seemed that, this hill project’s gradient is 68%! imagine! so much higher than class 4! can’t blame the residents for living in fear that some disaster is waiting to happen.

there were a number of press present for this protest. the VIP present ere YB teh, the assemblyman from tanjung bungah and YB phee, exco for social welfare and environment department.  the CM was invited but he sent YB phee instead. YB phee said that halfway through, the CM called him to check if the turned up!

Read the rest of this entry »

the speakers l to r: choo choon kai (suaram), YB chow kon yeow (PR), the moderator, lim kah cheng (councillor), teh leong meng (gerakan)

i attended the suaram forum ‘CAT ruling: change or same?’ as announced  in my mental jog blog. i was late… arrived about 8.30 of which when i walked in the 3rd speaker was just about to finish (there were 4 speakers).

my friend, christina reserved a seat for me next to her and she was seated right in front! alamak! i walked in and all eyes were on me.   anyway there were quite a number of empty seats. the room (2nd floor) was big but there were not too many people… maybe about 50. nevertheless, it was an interesting forum with lively debate from the speakers and the floor. i did not take down notes but let’s see what i remember here and there.

the 4 speakers were mr choo chon kai from suaram, ms im kah cheng, councillor, YB chow kon yeow, who is the state local government, traffic management and environment committee chairmanand mr teh leong meng from gerakan.  it was a pleasant surprise to not the presence of an opposition member – mr teh from gerakan.

well, when i walked in, mr teh was speaking.  i heard something “the CAT government not living up to its promise…” blah blah. sitting down for just 5 mins, his speech ended! pity i missed his speech as i’m sure he had a lot of criticisms of the present penang government, label the ‘CAT government’. never mind, there were still summing up time and Q&A.
Read the rest of this entry »

my reflection on blogging and the laws as based on the eLawyers conference held on saturday, please visit my mental jog blog.

UPDATED:  this post was picked up by malaysia today and posted at its website.

The second weekend of our Citizen Journalism workshop, had Anil Netto,  famous blogger and professional journalist, conducting it. As part of our assignment, all of us had to write an article on Penang. I choose to write on this topic, and here is the article, with some corrections done by Anil.

——————————————————————————–

I commute to work daily, sometimes in a car, sometimes on a bus. Many times, I get caught in a traffic jam during office rush hours. When it rains, the traffic situation gets worse. Such is Penang’s traffic system. Too many vehicles clog the road.

People who travel between the island and the mainland of Penang will either use the Penang Bridge or the ferry service. As the traffic flow increases, traffic congestion becomes a headache for motorists. The government has come up with a solution to this – a third link, i.e. the second Penang Bridge… but will this really be the solution? Do we really need the second Penang Bridge?

The 2nd Penang bridge will link Batu Maung on the island to Batu Kawan on the mainland. It will be 24 km in length (17 km over the sea). The cost of building the bridge, originally was at RM2.7 billion when it was first mooted in July 2007 but it sky-rocketed to RM4.3 billion in April 2008. now on April 2008 it is expected to cost RM4.3 billion.
Read the rest of this entry »

yes, now you see it…

This is one of the banners found in bukit gantang, perak.  nominations day haven’t even started and campaigning already started. Phew! What a hot battle the bukit gantang by-election is going to be. This picture was taken by one of our MAFREL member. Please go to the MAFREL website for more pictures.