KUALA Lumpur City Hall (DBKL) has promised to repair the shabby unit of single mother S. Kasthuri Bai at the Seri Pantai People’s Housing Project (PPR) in Jalan Pantai Dalam, Kuala Lumpur.
The unit, which was showing signs of disrepair especially in the kitchen and toilet, will be fixed as soon as possible, according to a statement issued by DBKL’s corporate communications unit.
“Following an inspection on Feb 13, we noticed the damage was more pronounced in the kitchen area which was exhibiting signs of deterioration from water seepage coming from the upstairs unit.
Kasthuri Bai shows the peeled off paint from the ceiling that falls onto the bathroom tub. - Filepic
“Immediate repairs will be carried out as soon as we can determine a suitable time with the owner,’’ the statement read.
On the naco window frames which keep falling off, the local authority said this could be because of overuse.
DBKL was responding to a StarMetro report on Feb 11 titled “Killer litter victim’s mum with house problem gets no response from DBKL”.
In the report, Kasthuri Bai, 50, said that she was saddled with mounting bills for her unit which was falling apart and that her complaints had fallen on deaf ears.
She was also reported as saying that the naco glass window panes kept falling off, the ceiling was leaking and paint was peeling off in the kitchen, bathroom and bedrooms.
Five years ago, Kasthuri Bai’s son, S. Sathiswaran, 15, was killed by a falling chair and following that incident, DBKL offered to move her to a “better” unit.
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According to her, the officers who helped to facilitate her move said the unit would be rent-free, but DBKL has yet to respond to her queries on this.
Kasthuri Bai claimed that she made numerous trips to the DBKL offices at the PPR and the housing department in Jalan Raja Abdullah to get more details, but she was given the runaround.
DBKL, in its statement. has maintained that upon checking the data in its ehousing complaints system there was no complaints officially registered by Kasthuri Bai.
“Upon further investigation, we found that the complainant lodged a report regarding the unit in 2020 during the movement control order.
“We had explained to the complainant then that an official complaint must be submitted online via the ehousing system, which the complainant had failed to do,” it stated.
