Forced out to suburbs

With the increasing rent and high cost of living, KL is no longer affordable to the low income earners.

IF THE government continues to sell prime land in the city and engage into joint-venture agreements favouring developers, the capital city will eventually turn into a ghetto due to lack of affordable housing for the urban poor, warned a Kuala Lumpur member of parliament.

Titiwangsa MP Datuk Johari Abdul Ghani said certain areas in Kuala Lumpur were already turning into mini ghettos, and looking shabby and dirty.

At the same time, Malaysians were also shunning to work and live in such parts of the city due to high rentals, in favour of the outskirts, giving rise to the heavy presence of foreign workers, he said.

These foreigners, he added, were being cramped into small units by their employers as the rentals in the city was high.

“As a result of sky-high rent, many property owners have no choice but to lease or rent out their shophouses to employers of foreign workers who would pack each unit with over 30 people,’’ he said.

Johari, who is also chairman of UDA Holdings Bhd, said migrant workers did not mind living in cramped quarters as long as they could save on transportation cost while the poverty stricken residents opted to leave the city.

“They (migrant workers) work at construction sites, restaurants, hotels, and offices as labourers, cleaners, sweepers, security guards, waiters, cooks and janitors in the city,’’ he said.

He predicted that foreign workers were probably going to outnumber the locals living and working in the city as more locals leave in search of affordable housing.

Kuala Lumpur is home to migrants

National Public Complaints and Welfare Service Centre (Pusat Aduan Rakyat Malaysia (PAR) chairman Datuk A. Chandrakumanan said some parts of Bukit Bintang along Jalan Bedara, the Sun Complex area, Chow Kit, Jalan Silang, Jalan Petaling and Jalan Metro Perdana in the city had a large community of migrant workers living in old flats and shophouses.

Unkempt: Downtown KL, Kotaraya area is looking shabby and dirty. It is populated by foreign workers.

A check by StarMetro at some of these spots found that it is not too far-fetched to say that foreigners outnumbered Malaysians.

In Jalan Silang for instance, the entire stretch of pre-war shophouses were run and operated by Bangladeshi and Nepalese businessmen, while in Petaling Street, the Nepalese and Myanmarese workers were running the shops and stalls on behalf of their employers.

Over in Chow Kit and Jalan Masjid India, the number of Indonesians was increasing each month.

These areas are looking shabbier than ever.

It had been reported that out of six million people in the Klang Valley, 222,843 were registered foreigners residing in Kuala Lumpur, 577,427 were illegal immigrants registered under the Home Ministry’s 6P programme, and 438,425 were illegal immigrants yet to be registered.

Severe shortage of affordable housing

Apart from the rent, Johari explained that many people, particularly young executives, shunned the city as it was too exhaustive to commute.

Make no mistake, plenty of young working adults were eager to live in the city, especially newly married couples, among them is 29-year-old Vijenthi Malar from Sentul.

“The joint household income of both my husband and I, is RM10, 000.

“But we can only afford a 459 sq ft studio apartment costing RM400,000 in Jalan Kelang Lama.

“With a baby on the way and my mother-in-law living with me, the cramped apartment is hardly conducive for a family of four,’’ she lamented.

Hence Vijenthi decided to buy a bigger and more spacious landed property of the same value, albeit 64km out of Kuala Lumpur.

“I have to travel daily, but we eventually hope to get a job near our home,’’ she added.

But what is interesting to note is that while Vijenthi can be considered a middle-income earner, there are, however, more than 40% of city dwellers living below the poverty line earning less than RM2,500 a month.

Stop selling our land

This is why Johari argues for government agencies like Kuala Lumpur City Hall (DBKL) and the Federal Territories Ministry to focus on rebuilding old government flats in prime areas solely for the low-income earners.

He said old government flats such as the Pekeliling Flats and Sri Pahang Flats in Bangsar were good examples of government housing meant for the urban poor and should be developed for the poor.

“I personally do not have any issue with the joint ventures between DBKL and private developers when it comes to developing strategic land in Kuala Lumpur belonging to DBKL.

“They need to maximise the value of such land and develop it according to the Draft KL City Plan 2020,’’ he said.

“Notwithstanding my support for the above, when such joint ventures are for the purposes of re-developing existing Kawasan Perumahan Awam (public housing area), I would want to see such re-development not causing DBKL to neglect its social obligation in providing housing for the poor of the city,’’ Johari said.

He cited several examples of ageing government housing units in Bandar Tun Razak, Wangsa Maju, Bukit Bintang and Titiwangsa which had the potential to be re-developed with higher plot ratio and density and with bigger space.

Chandrakumanan agreed, “DBKL must re-look at redevelopments with a win-win situation in mind for the residents that are still living in these units.

“This will allow the city’s real poor to continue to reside within the city centre and provide essential services as part of the city’s workforce,’’ added Johari.

PR1MA and Rumawip housing projects

Both the Federal Territories Affordable Housing (Rumawip) and PR1MA housing projects were meant to help low-income earners buy the house of their dream, but in reality, units for both schemes are costing between RM300, 000 and RM450,000.

It is simply too expensive for the urban poor who cannot afford even the RM35,000 low-cost PPR units in the city.

Both Johari and Chandrakumanan backed their argument with recent DBKL statistics showing that out of 45,357 PPR units offered for sale to those living in various government housing, after three years of such an offer being made, a little more than 11,000 units were eventually sold.

“This shows that they cannot even afford to buy cheap accommodation.

“Is this not reflective of the income bracket of those living in government housing schemes,’’ Johari asked.

“Don’t get me wrong, I support the PR1MA and RUMAWIP projects.

“These are future homes that will enable the medium-income earners to own so that they will continue to be able to live and work in the city; however, they do not cater for the hardcore poor working in the city,’’ Johari said, referring to the general workers such as security guards, people working for local municipalities, labourers, medical staff, and lower grade civil servants.

Gazette existing government land

Both Johari and Chandrakumanan reiterated their call to the government to gazette all existing government land meant for housing. Private developers, they said, were profit-oriented bodies and the income from public housing projects would not be able to cover the cost of such re-development.

“As such, there will be no guarantee that the plight of the poor residing in the city will be addressed.

“This is why there is a crucial need to gazette the existing public housing land to remain as such, and the government has to ensure that any redevelopment of these lands must use public funds to cater for the poor,’’ Johari said.

“They must also allocate grants to DBKL every year for the next 10 years for the purpose of re-development of the existing public housing; and allow higher plot ratio and density to the existing public housing schemes with bigger space and better facilities,’’ concluded Johari.