AS THE Astaka Sports Complex field in Section 52, Petaling Jaya, is often a sought-after place for sports events, the public is again infuriated by the poor maintenance of amenities especially the toilets.
As of Tuesday (Jan 23), the women’s toilet adjacent to the tennis courts had a notice of temporary closure of the toilet “due to lack of water supply”.
There is also no indication of when the toilet will be restored.
As a frequent jogger at the park, IT specialist Amira Umar, 41, said the Petaling Jaya City Council (MBPJ) should be more proactive in maintaining the public amenities at the park.
“They should at least state in the notice when the issue will be resolved. When there are a lot of people using the field for sports, it will be a mess if the toilet use is limited, especially for women.
“There are also not well maintained toilets near the outdoor gym area at the field; it looks horrible and I don’t understand why the city council is unable to upkeep these facilities,” she said.
Meanwhile, a mother-of-two who only wanted to be known as Latifah, 38, whose sons often participate in sports training at the Astaka field, said it is a major inconvenience when the women’s toilet is out of order.
“Where are we supposed to go if we need to use the toilet? We cannot just enter the men’s toilet because it is uncomfortable for us and unsafe.
“It is also disturbing to see that when the men’s toilet is full, some of them have to pee outside on the grass. This is really a third-world mentality,” she lamented.
The notice outside the door of the women’s toilet has an office and mobile phone number of the public toilet control unit of MBPJ’s department of health and environmental services, with QR codes to scan and lodge complaints.
However, it was a comedy of errors when the laminated acrylic plaque of the officer in charge at MBPJ had the wrong mobile prefix number (019 instead of 017).
When StarMetro called the number it was answered by a disgruntled person on the line shouting “salah nombor lah! (wrong number!)".
When StarMetro called the correct number that was on another notice, the officer-in-charge Azizul Azzim Norehan from MBPJ’s department of health and environmental services said the toilet repairs, as a result of a broken pipe, would be handled by MPBJ’s engineering department.
He said the issue would be ideally resolved within 48 hours.
