“Many of the cases involved development that were over 20 years old.” - Rodziah Ismail
SELANGOR government will not arbitrarily absorb debts from housing developers to solve problems regarding strata ownership.
Selangor housing, urban well-being and entrepreneur development committee chairman Rodziah Ismail said the state government would assess each individual case and factors favouring both the state and purchaser so that strata titles could be issued.
She cited a case involving a strata ownership problem in Taman Putra Perdana, Sepang, where the state government absorbed the land premium owed by the original developer.
She said a task force, set up in January this year with the Selangor Land and Mines Office (PTGS) to solve such issues, had 611 pending cases.
“Many of the cases involved development that were over 20 years old,” she said, citing one solved case in Putra Perdana involving 12,845 buyers.
“This is because at that time, developers were allowed to proceed with the construction before settling the land premium.
“Most of the original developers had dissolved or did not have enough funds to submit the entire strata title application,” Rodziah said in replying a question by Halimey Abu Bakar (PH-Seri Setia) at the Selangor state assembly. Halimey wanted to know the state’s solution to strata title ownership problems.
Rodziah said new developments were not given such leeway, as work could only start after the land premium had been paid and the strata title had to be transferred in a year after completion.
She said the task force helped to identify and classify the problems accordingly before further action was taken.
“For example, some cases are due to the liquidator’s inaction. The court order on liquidators did not include a deadline, resulting in some liquidators dragging the case and eventually expecting the state to solve the problem.
“I will propose an enactment to set a deadline for liquidators to settle the problem, failing which a new liquidator will be appointed,” she said.
Rodziah said other causes of delay included buyers not being able to afford the Memorandum of Transfer fees and failing to meet requirements by PTGS due to problems such as applications by non-bumiputra buyers for designated bumiputra lots.
“We have advised the task force to set up a war room to solve the problem as soon as possible, at least in the next two years,” she added.
Elizabeth Wong (PH-Bukit Lanjan) raised a question on how the state had prioritised the cases, citing an ownership title problem in Taman Daya, Selayang, that was more than 30 years old.
She said there were apartments, shoplots, houses and a condominium built on government land in Taman Daya.
“I brought up the case at the Gombak land and district office in 2018 but they have yet to call for a meeting,” said Wong.
Rodziah replied that it was likely a case where the state was involved in a joint venture with a developer, and that the developer had failed to pay the land premium.
“If the development was built on government land, it will be categorised as illegal. I will check on this case,” she said.
