The National Film Development Corporation (Finas) will re-evaluate the issuance of the Certificate of Filming (SPP) following allegations of damage to fossils that are millions of years old after filming was done by a production company at Gua Matsoorat recently.
Finas chairman Zakaria Abdul Hamid said re-evaluation of the SPP would be made if a production team wanted to shoot at a location that has national treasures to ensure that the issue would not arise again.
"I have advised the Finas enforcement division to re-evaluate all the SPPs that we have issued. We have to see which areas they want to do filming in.
"If the areas are sensitive ones such as sites with prehistoric treasures and so on, we should re-evaluate the issuance of the SPP to ensure that such things do not recur.”
He said this after officiating at the closing ceremony of the Music Video Production and Copyright Workshop at the Ipoh Town Hall.
A Facebook posting had gone viral on social media following damage to the site after the filming of a popular drama, with claims that the production crew threw garbage everywhere with some pictures showing the damage and the engraving of the drama's title on the cave wall.
Zakaria said his team was disappointed with the incidents of intrusion that occurred and would suggest some measures to be taken after they received a full report on the incident.
He said Finas was still investigating the matter and was waiting for a full report from the production team to obtain a clearer explanation.
"I was also asked by the minister to get the real story on this matter. This is an encroachment on national treasures which the production crew should have been careful about," he added.
An earlier reported said the Perak government is investigating these claims.
State Housing, Local Government and Tourism Committee chairman Datuk Nolee Ashilin Mohamed Radzi said they received a complaint regarding the damage at the historical site from a non-governmental organisation (NGO).
"The Ipoh City Council had given Syarikat Juita Viden permission to carry out filming around Ipoh from Feb 20 to April 30.
"Upon checking with the production company, we were told they only carried out filming outside the cave, ” he told Bernama.
However, she said, there were traces of damage to the fossils in the cave but the production company denied its involvement as claimed by the cave operator.
Following that, Nolee Ashilin said they have arranged a dialogue session with the production company and cave operator to find a solution.
She explained that security measures had been stepped up together with the Perak State Agricultural Development Corporation, which manages the surrounding area for agricultural projects in the city.
Director Michael Ang said on Instagram that he regretted the incident and that they were trying to find the culprits.– Bernama
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