Durian farmers arrested in wild party at homestay

Compiled by C. ARUNO, CHARLES RAMENDRAN and R. ARAVINTHAN

A WILD party organised by a group of Musang King durian farmers from Raub came to an abrupt end when police raided the premises of a homestay in Bentong at midnight on Wednesday.

The eight farmers had also engaged 16 women, comprising 13 Thais and three Laotians, to spice up their party, Kosmo! reported.

Pahang police chief Datuk Seri Yahaya Othman said a public tip-off led to the raid where a total of 28 people, including the farmers, were arrested.

He said although police did not find any banned substances at the premise, all of those nabbed tested positive for drugs.

Yahaya said police learnt that the farmers had organised the wild party at a cost of RM4,000 a day.

He said the detainees, aged between 19 and 44, were remanded for four days and would be charged with drug abuse.

Yahaya advised homestay owners to be wary when renting out their premises and ensure it is not used for illegal purposes.

> In an attempt to hoodwink the local authorities into paying them cash aid meant for flood victims, an undisclosed number of residents in Rantau Panjang, Kelantan, had sneaked into relief centres as evacuees, Berita Harian reported.

The unscrupulous individuals whose homes were either unaffected or slightly affected by floods, had done so to receive the RM3,500 cash aid paid out by the state government to each affected family.

There were also those who invited their family members living in other unaffected districts to move into the relief centres in order to claim the cash aid.

This had resulted in victims of genuine cases moving into mosques and other shacks due to the lack of space at the centres.

Apart from the cash aid, the selfish individuals had also claimed food vouchers given out by the Welfare Department.

The above articles are compiled from the vernacular newspapers (Bahasa Malaysia, Chinese and Tamil dailies). As such, stories are grouped according to the respective language/medium. Where a paragraph begins with a >, it denotes a separate news item.