A vigil in solidarity with the landslide victims was held at the Penang Town Hall this morning (see above) while inside the building the Penang Island City Council was holding its full council meeting. Later, three representatives from the vigil were allowed in to submit a memorandumto the major who said the council would also be probing the incident.
Disturbed by official comments in recent days, soil scientist Dr Kam Suan Pheng has sent in this commentary:
Some have described the politicians’ responses in trying to deflect the blame for the landslide down the line as “tai chi”. But a friend who practises tai chi told me that this ancient Chinese exercise for health of mind, body and spirit is too wholesome an activity to be used as an analogy for the blame game that is going on. So perhaps the elephant and the blindfolded men above might be a more apt depiction of the recent blinkered statements by those in positions of power.
The following is a response by Rexy Prakash Chacko, joint coordinator of Penang Hills Watch, a Penang Forum initiative, to recent quotes in a press report.
Another statement from Penang Forum:
It is with great sadness that Penang Forum is issuing this press statement about the Bukit Kukus landslide tragedy.
So… a body has been found, which was not listed as missing. What was he doing at the site? Was this an undocumented worker? And are there more who are missing? This raises the question of the status of workers in the construction industry.
Meanwhile, Penang Forum has just released this statement, warning that dangers still lurk at the Bukit Kukus landslide area. Did they really check for hidden streams in the area? And they still want to proceed with all these projects? What is driving them? Is it greed, pride, money or what? If an MPPP project can end up like this, how can we hope that the council can monitor other projects closely…
Aliran has just released this statement:
Aliran is appalled at the loss of workers’ lives in a landslide at the Bukit Kukus paired road construction site in Penang. The landslide brought down several containers and wooden shacks, claiming at least seven lives with another three victims still missing and injuring three people.
A group of Penangites held a vigil this evening for the workers who lost their lives in the Bukit Kukus landslide on Friday afternoon and the Tanjung Bungah landslide victims at the Granito construction site exactly a year ago.
So another landslide again in Penang.. this time about a dozen dead or missing at a construction site for the elevated Paya Terubong “paired road”.
A concerned Penangite has sent in a dozen questions that MPs and Penang state assembly members should raise about the controversial RM46bn transport proposal which is being pushed through despite strong public opposition.
Here is what I received:
This piece by Laurence Loh calls on all of us to heed the alarm bells set off by the UN about an impending climate genocide. The Penang government in particular has to take the first step by reviewing all its proposals by applying the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as evaluation criteria. It should insist that its project partners be ready to justify their proposals along SDG criteria to independent reviewers and to the people of Penang. They must be prepared to modify them if they are not compatible, or worse, if they are directly contradictory to these SDGs.
The collapse of the beam placed at the site of the construction of a RM275m “paired road” at Jalan Tun Sardon highlights the risks of construction along the hill slopes of Penang. The incident occurred just before Penang Forum released a media statement calling for an independent panel to review the EIA of the controversial Pan Island Link highway.