DAP rep claims two nuclear plants being planned for Johor

AN Opposition assemblyman has claimed that two nuclear plants will be built by the Federal Government in Johor within the next eight years.

Tan Chen Choon (DAP-Jementah) alleged that Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Datuk Mah Siew Keong had made a statement to that effect.

He claimed that Mah had stated that the Federal Government was in the final process of drafting the Control of Atomic Energy to enable the project to get off the ground.

“The nuclear power plant costing RM21.3bil was announced by the Federal Govern-ment in June, 2010, under the Economic Transformation Program (ETP) where seven locations were identified in several states including Kedah, Perak, Terengganu, and two in Johor,” he said when debating the state Budget at the state assembly yesterday.

Earlier, Mentri Besar Datuk Mohamed Khaled Nordin had quashed claims that the size of Malay Reserve Land in the state had shrunk, particularly in areas where developments are taking place in Iskandar Malaysia.

He said the claims were untrue as such lands are protected under the Malay Reserve Enactment 1936 and Federal Constitution.

He said under such laws if the land owners wanted to cancel its status with an excuse for development, the person must replace it with another plot of land with same value or size.

“Both existing laws showed the seriousness of both the state and Federal governments in handling the Malay Reserve Land issue in Johor.

“The state government has also taken some proactive measures to ensure such lands are protected,” he said in reply to questions by Datuk Maulizan Bujang (BN-Tiram), Ayub Jamil (BN-Rengit), A. Aziz Ismail (BN-Senggarang), Datuk Samsol Bari Jamali (BN-Semarang) at the state assembly yesterday.

He said based on the current data, Malay Reserve Land had increased from 87,563.6ha in 1957 to 432,157ha in September this year.

“This shows that there is an increase in the size of Malay Reserve Land to 279,744ha or 18.2% since our country gained independence 57 years ago. In Johor Baru and Kulaijaya alone, which is under the Iskandar Malaysia area, lands gazetted as Malay Reserve have also increased to 23,517.37ha this year from a mere 1,921.4ha in 1957,” he said.

Mohamed Khaled said under the Enactment, the state government agreed to enforce a ruling to seize any Malay Reserve Land that had changed ownership to non-Malays.