ADUN Teratai – Page 2 – Peter Tan

MPAJ To Remove Road Hump

After a two-month battle to have the road hump outside my house removed, I can finally breathe a sigh of relief. Encik Jamali, the Majlis Perbandaran Ampang Jaya (MPAJ) engineer who oversaw the construction, came over to discuss a resolution to my complaint.

This came about just two days after the news of my complaint was published in The Star on 6 November. Berita Harian ran a similar article in 19 October. My neighbours and I also submitted an appeal letter to the Yang DiPertua Majlis Perbandaran Ampang Jaya Dato’ Mohammad Bin Yacob on 28 October asking for his intervention in this matter.

Together with two other affected neighbours, we invited MCA Pandan Division Head of Legal Bureau Gary Lim to join in the meeting as he has been pursuing this matter with MPAJ on our behalf after we were given the cold shoulder by people whom we went to seek help from. Gary was stuck in a traffic jam at the Federal Highway due to the heavy rain and could not make it. His assistant came in his place.

Encik Jamali apologised on behalf of MPAJ for causing the inconvenience to me. I told him that I was glad he came to see for himself the problems we have been facing and that we hope to resolve the matter amicably. He proposed paving a path with interlocking blocks on the strip of land beside the hump as a by-pass.

We rejected the proposal as the pavement will invite other neighbours to park their cars on it and we will be back to square one with me having to traverse the hump again. Moreover, the hump is blocking the flow of rainwater down the road. The heavy rain prior to the meeting had caused a large puddle of water to form on the opposite neighbours’ driveway. They have had to suffer this problem each time it rained after the construction of the hump.

We told Encik Jamali that as far as we, the residents of the three houses facing the hump, are concerned, we want it removed. And if MPAJ wants to rebuild it further down the road, we advised him to seek the consent of the house owners and residents affected to avoid another discontent from arising.

Encik Jamali agreed that the procedure for building road humps as practised by the Majlis Perbandaran Seberang Prai (MPSP) is a good one. I had attached the MPSP flyer on the requirements for applications of road humps to the appeal letter to the Yang DiPertua earlier. Applications must be submitted with letters of consent from property owners of houses where the hump is to be constructed and signatures from four house facing the hump. He said that MPAJ will come out with a similar procedure for future applications of road humps in residential areas in the municipality.

We also pointed out to him that we know residents along the road were asked to sign a petition in support of the hump after it was built and that was not right. MPAJ and ahli majlis Dorothy Cheong had said that the requests were made in July by many residents. The road hump was built on 12 September while the petition was signed twelve days later on 24 September. He just smiled.

After further discussion, he agreed to remove the road hump. I asked for a time frame. He told us to give him two weeks. We agreed. He said he will report to his superiors regarding this new development. I truly want to believe Encik Jamali’s words but I will keep my fingers crossed until the road hump is removed once and for all.

Gary called his assistant to check on the outcome of the meeting a short while after Encik Jamali left. He said that he will continue follow up on the case until the matter is resolved. The neighbours, Wuan and I appreciate Gary’s effort in pursuing this matter on our behalf. At the very least, he was willing to listen to our grouses and made attempts to assist us.

I was given the run around when I first filed a complaint with MPAJ. Likewise, when I sought the assistance from ADUN for Teratai Jenice Lee to resolve this matter, she got ahli majlis MPAJ Dorothy Cheong to look into it. The latter did not bother to understand the hardship that “people of my situation” have to face after the hump was built and kept telling me that a majority of ten residents have requested for it and took no further action.

Dorothy Cheong’s arrogance in belittling my complaint is regrettable She was reported by The Star to have said that “We can’t entertain one person’s complaint as we want to help everyone”. It is noble of her to want to help everyone but her disregard for the rights of the minority is most contemptible.

I am absolutely convinced that my complaint is valid. The hump affects my right to access to public facilities under the Persons with Disabilities Act 2008. Members of Parliament, State Assembly Members and municipal councillors should be educated on disability and minority equality before they are allowed to take office. This is to ensure they serve with fairness and equity. In the meantime, I await the removal of the hump with bated breath.

Speed Hump A Hindrance – StarMetro – 6 November, 2012

This article on the speed hump issue outside my house was reported by Fazleena Aziz of StarMetro. The following is my response to several points that Dorothy Cheong raised in the article which was not exactly what transpired between us. She is the ahli majlis MPAJ for Zone 20 of which Pandan Perdana is part of.

In the two email responses to my complaints, she neither suggested any meeting nor ways to resolve this issue. So when she said that she “had asked the two groups of residents to have a discussion about it”, that is not true. She did nothing of that sort.

All the while, she was only interested in maintaining the hump by telling me that it was built at the requests of residents and that she believed “people of my situation” would welcome it as it is for my safety and that of other residents and that I should view this in a positive manner.

I found that statement patronising. How would she know what “people of my situation” go through every day to come to that conclusion? Likewise the MPAJ officer I spoke to earlier parroted the same answer and asked me why I do not like the hump which is for my safety.

In my response to Dorothy Cheong, I told her off for assuming that “people of my situation” would welcome the hump. She never even bothered to meet me to see for herself my safety concerns. I also told her that I have no faith in her as the ahli majlis. It was then that ADUN for Teratai Jenice Lee suggested that MPAJ initiate a meeting to resolve this issue.

Dorothy Cheong was wrong and arrogant to say that it is only one person’s complaint. She must have forgotten that another neighbour went to her office to make a complaint against the hump as well and then went back again to check on the progress of her complaint.

Even if there is only one complainant, the matter should be looked into seriously as it involves the accessibility issue of a disabled person. By making that statement, did she mean that the rights of the minority are not relevant? Is it all right to use the might of the majority to trample over the minority?

There is the matter of residents being asked to sign a petition to support the hump on 24 September, twelve days after it was built, which contradicts her statement that the request was made by 10 residents in July. If MPAJ had already accepted the requests, why the need for the petition after the hump was built?

To date, she has not addressed the issue on why neither the three house owners whose properties facing the hump were not consulted nor their consent sought. Do we not have a say in this matter as the parties most affected? Why was a meeting not called in the first place before the construction to avoid all these problems?

It was only after being interviewed by the press that she suggested moving the hump subject to the agreement of the residents who requested for it. The truth is that she has never conveyed this “option” to any of us complainants before.

Like Wuan rightly pointed out, it is preposterous that we have to ask for their permission to remove the hump when our permission was never sought before they built it outside our house. What kind of logic and procedure is this? Where is justice where our rights are concerned?

This article on the speed hump outside my house appeared in StarMetro on 6 November, 2012

Click on image for larger version.

Pandan Perdana Pavement Upgrade – Never On Sunday

Upgrading of pavement at Pandan Perdana.

A few stretches of pavements at Jalan Perdana 3/1 in Pandan Perdana are currently being upgraded. I am very particular about these upgrading works because the previous upgrading on a different stretch of the pavement was done haphazardly and could not be used safely although I have stressed to the previous ADUN for Teratai on the need to follow the code of practice. He was the one who got the allocation for upgrading part of the pavement in 2007.

Anyway, imagine to my horror when I found out that there were no kerb ramps to the pavements in the current upgrading works. I asked around and was made to understand that the MP for Pandan Datuk Seri Ong Tee Keat had provided an allocation for these works. I posted a note in Facebook and tagged him, asking him to ensure that there are kerbs ramps as one of the pavements has a bus stop. If we cannot get to the bus stop, we definitely cannot board the buses when RapidKL deploy their non-step buses on this route.

The bus stop in the midst of pavement upgrading works at Pandan Perdana.

Through Facebook, I was given the phone number of Ong Tee Keat’s Service Centre Public Liaison Officer, Kent Ng, together with the office phone and email. I called the office number on Sunday afternoon. There was no answer. Then I called Kent and explained the issue to him. He said he would get back to me. I followed up with an email briefly detailing on how the kerb ramp should be constructed.

Work on the pavement is currently still on going. I was afraid that the pavement would be completed before any action is taken. I waited until this afternoon and called Kent again. He told me that he would submit my complaint to Datuk Seri Ong. I asked him when and explained the urgency of the matter. What he said to me following that was totally unexpected.

No kerb ramp.

“Mister, you called me on Sunday. Do you know Sunday is rest day?”

It was not what he said that irked me but the tone of him saying it. I said I knew but it is Monday now and I am calling him again to check and ask him when action will be taken. He gave me the same line that he will submit my complaint and that I had called him on a Sunday. YES, I KNEW IT WAS SUNDAY! If the matter was not urgent, I would not have called.

After that incident, and as far as I am concerned, I have done the necessary to enlighten Datuk Seri Ong regarding this matter. I shall wait and see how it pans out. Surely, the MP for Pandan who is also the Minister of Transport already understands the issues of public transport with regards to the street environment. His ministry and related agencies have been engaging disabled persons’ organisations in this matter for a long time already. I pray he will do the right thing.

Hmm, I hear the Chordettes singing…

Another end of pavement with no kerb ramp.

Close up of the dug up pavement with kerb.