GEORGE TOWN: Tempers flared outside the Penang state legislative assembly building in Lebuh Light here as residents from Bandar Sri Pinang demanded answers over the controversial Jelutong landfill rehabilitation project.
About 30 residents, led by ProtectKarpal and the Bandar Sri Pinang Residents Association, gathered on Wednesday (May 13) after submitting a formal complaint to the Penang Public Accounts Committee (PAC).
The group, which wants the RM1bil project probed, claimed that it had gone through at least seven extensions of time since 2020 while its environmental impact assessment (EIA) had failed to secure Environment Department (DOE) approval five times in a row.
They also questioned how a coastal reclamation component eventually became part of the project despite it allegedly not being included in the original winning tender proposal.
ProtectKarpal and residents association chairman Dr K Ganesh said residents were frustrated over what they viewed as weak public disclosure involving a project affecting public land and coastline.
"For residents, this is not an abstract contract.
"It is about whether a promised rehabilitation will finally make their neighbourhood safer, or whether they will be left with more delay, more uncertainty and a reclamation project they were never asked to approve," he told the media.
According to the group, PLB Engineering Bhd’s revised tender proposal submitted in 2016 contained no coastal reclamation component.
They claimed that the 2020 joint development agreement (JDA) later introduced reclamation works, while the 2025 EIA report showed a 28.3ha (70-acre) reclamation component.
Citing PLB Engineering's Bursa Malaysia filing and annual reports, the group claimed the project had gone through at least seven extensions of time since the JDA was signed in February 2020, with the latest extension approved until Feb 28 this year.
They said the company had since applied for an eighth extension, which is expected to be decided by the state executive council on May 20.
"This is not one missed deadline.
"This is six years of repeated deadline extensions for what the JDA defined as basic preconditions, which are conditions that had to be met before the project could even begin.
"The DoE's five EIA rejections are the visible tip of a much larger governance failure that the PAC complaint now places on the public record," the group said in a statement.
Dr Ganesh stressed that residents were not opposed to rehabilitating the former landfill site, but wanted transparency and proper scrutiny over changes to the project.
The group also urged the PAC to obtain and disclose the full JDA, extension-related documents, EIA, traffic impact assessment and social impact assessment reports, as well as the DOE rejection letters.
Sungai Pinang assemblyman Lim Siew Khim, who met the residents outside the building, told them engagement sessions with stakeholders had been held previously.
The response drew immediate frustration from several protesters, who said loudly: "You have let us down. We couldn’t find you.
"We have to meet you at state assembly.
"Please give us an appointment."
The matter is expected to be discussed further during the assembly meeting.
