By Ng Cheng Yee
chengyee@thestar.com.my
Wednesday August 17, 2011
KUALA LUMPUR: A meeting will be arranged between Jalan Sultan shop owners and traders affected in the land acquisition for the proposed My Rapid Transit (MRT) project and the Land Public Transport Commission (SPAD), said MCA president Datuk Seri Dr Chua Soi Lek.
He said the owners and traders had appealed for their views and concerns to be heard by the relevant parties in the acquisition exercise, which will be carried out by Syarikat Prasarana Negara Berhad.
“The traders have been doing business in the area for a long time and to ask them to move out of their premises will mean losing their source of income,” he told reporters after meeting some of the affected traders yesterday.
Dr Chua said he had brought up the land acquisition issue at the National Economic Council meeting on Monday.
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| Looking for options: Dr Chua (second from left) listening to (from left) Chan Kwok Chin, 58, Tan Yik Chong, 78, Steven Yong, 65, and Judy’s views at a dialogue session with the Jalan Sultan shop owners and traders in Kuala Lumpur yesterday. Behind them is shop owner Daniel Wong, 43. |
SPAD, he added, had agreed to consider the possibility of a realignment to the proposed MRT line.
“The SPAD chief executive officer (Mohd Nur Kamal) has agreed that it will consider the possibility of a realignment so that the project can be carried out without affecting any of the shops or traders there,” he added.
Dr Chua also urged the affected owners and traders to prepare a memorandum, which would include all their dissatisfaction and complaints against the project.
He said the first option was to push for a realignment of the track.
“The second option is for the traders to move out during the project's construction but be given priority to move back into the area to resume business once it is completed,” he said.
Judy Tan, 50, whose family owns the Lok Ann Hotel in the area, said it was only logical if the traders were asked to evacuate their buildings during the project's construction.
“They cannot just simply acquire our land as they cannot put a price on our building, which is 70 years old.
“We are fine if we are only asked to evacuate for a few years for the project to be carried out but it is illogical for them to take our land as the project involves underground works,” she said.
Choy Foong Meng, 55, who has owned a festival decoration business in the area for 16 years, said most traders had been there for a long time.
“If we were to move out, where are we supposed to relocate? This will only cause more hardship to us,” she said.
KVMRT: Wouldn't you find it funny when foreigners concentrated in Petaling Street have their owners Finally spoke up. It has been a norm for foreigners (Bangladeshi, Nepalese and Indonesians) to manned their business operations there, and some of them are owners. The real issue is when their shops/lots are to be acquired, those China-man make fuss out of nothing.
As government requested Petaling Street aka. KL Chinatown to be local centric only, they put lame excuses to hire foreigners and it's already losing its heritage value and KLites feel unsecured to go to Petaling Street.
As far we are concerned, realignment is very impossible due to optimization of cost and route. However, SPAD agree to look into it and resolve the issue with those affected.
