KL residents to sue DBKL over flood mitigation plans

A GROUP of Kuala Lumpur residents are proceeding with a lawsuit to compel Kuala Lumpur City Hall (DBKL) to provide detailed updates on City Hall’s flood mitigation plans ahead of the coming monsoon season.

In a statement sent by the residents’ lawyer Lim Wei Jiet, he said that DBKL’s Flash Flood Action Plan 2022, which was revealed in May, does not contain adequately detailed information that would allow meaningful engagement, scrutiny and accountability by the public.

“Further, the ‘Flash Flood Action Plan 2022’ was also drafted before the Auditor-General's report was released in August 2022. Hence, it does not take into account the multiple weaknesses identified by the Auditor-General in August 2022, which is crucial to mitigate flooding in Kuala Lumpur.

“Simply put, the ‘Pelan Tindakan Banjir Kilat 2022’ is an outdated plan which is inadequate to deal with the incoming monsoon season,” said Lim in the statement.

The residents had earlier sent a letter of demand to DBKL requesting for information, which DBKL responded to on Sept 22.

In their reply, DBKL stated that it was working with other agencies to mitigate future floods according to their action plan

In the statement, DBKL added that residents could refer to the Auditor-General's Report 2021 Series 1 at https://lkan.audit.gov.my/.

In August, the Auditor-General released a report highlighting several points of failure by DBKL to carry out flood mitigation measures based on its own flood master plan.

The report said that eight out of 104 of proposed flood mitigation measures had been implemented or were still in the process of being implemented.

“Due to the gravity and urgency of the matter, we have no choice but to file the suit in court. We hope the judiciary will compel DBKL and the Federal Territories Minister to provide us the required information for the sake of all Kuala Lumpur residents," added Lim.