Jawatankuasa khas kabinet yang dibentuk untuk mengkaji isu air di
Selangor memutuskan bahawa terdapat perkara pokok dan prosedur yang
masih belum dipenuhi untuk membenarkan Selangor mengambil alih SYABAS,
katanya.Bagaimanapun Timbalan Perdana Menteri Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin berkata keputusan akhir akan hanya dibuat selepas peguam negara meneliti perkara itu.
Peguam negara telah diarahkan untuk mengadakan mesyuarat berhubung perkara itu pada petang ini, kata Muhyiddin selepas mempengerusikan mesyuarat selama tiga jam di Putrajaya hari ini.
Antara yang masih berbangkit dalam isu pengambilalihan SYABAS itu ialah kegagalan kerajaan negeri untuk membayar gantirugi kepada pemegang konsesi berkenaan apabila tidak bersetuju menaikkan tarif air berjadual.
Kataya, perkara itu masih tertangguh di mahkamah kerana SYABAS mengemukakan saman ke atas kerajaan Selangor.
Selangor pada 2009 enggan membenarkan tarif air dinaikkan sekiranya SYABAS tidak mengurangkan air tak terhasil (NRW) yang pada waktu ini melibatkan satu pertiga daripada bekalannya.
Ditanya mengapakah Selangor tidak dijemput hadir ke perbincangan hari ini, Muhyiddin berkata mesyuarat hari ini adalah pertemuan peringkat persekutuan.
Katanya beberapa perkara akan melibatkan selangor tetapi perbincangan hari ini adalah dalam ruang lintup kuasa persekutuan.-malaysiakini
Kenyataan Muhyiddin Bukti Selangor Tiada Krisis Air
RM225j pada SYABAS jika Rozali letak jawatan
Pulling plug on water rationing reveals Umno ploy, says Selangor
Putrajaya’s admission that water rationing was not necessary in Selangor and Kuala Lumpur has proven that the issue was a political gimmick to discredit the Selangor government, state executive council member Elizabeth Wong said today.
She also said that Syarikat Bekalan Air Selangor (Syabas) has been turned into an Umno tool to coerce the Selangor government into approving the construction of the Sungai Langat Water Treatment Plant or Langat 2.
Putrajaya has said it will tender out the RM3.6 billion plant despite Selangor’s objections, citing hefty costs for constructing a new plant that will take two years to complete.
“The federal government has no real solution in improving the supply and management of treated water. In fact, they are trying to sabotage Selangor government efforts to do the right thing to protect people’s interests,” she said in a statement today.
Wong said Putrajaya did not enumerate Langat 2’s capability to address the water shortage whereas Selangor already has a RM225 million plan for water mitigation.
“What is needed is an independent committee to decide which project is more effective in solving the shortage of treated water at a low cost,” she added.
She told the Barisan Nasional (BN) federal government to acknowledge its mistake when signing the water privatisation agreement in 2004, saying the error cannot be rectified until now.
“The Selangor government has the right to take over Syabas under the Water Supply Industry Act 2006. The federal government’s decision to stop this effort shows that the BN government is partial to corporate companies linked to Umno rather than protecting the people’s interests,” she said.
Syabas is controlled by Puncak Niaga Bhd that is run by corporate figure Tan Sri Rozali Ismail, who is the Selangor Umno treasurer.
Wong also said that the chairman of the special Cabinet committee on water, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin, has no experience in the matter and unable to contribute good ideas for water management.
“When he was the Johor mentri besar, he made the state water tariffs among the highest in the country,” she added.
She pointed out that efforts to privatise water supply in Johor to tycoon Tan Sri Syed Mokhtar Al-Bukhary’s MMC Corp Bhd will add to the “people’s burden”.
“The Johor people will face an unreasonable water tariff, unlike those in Selangor who receive free water. The BN government wants to pawn the rights of Johor people, but Pakatan Rakyat in Selangor will not keep quiet against those making a profit from people’s suffering,” the Bukit Lanjan assemblyman said.
Syed Mokhtar’s MMC conglomerate is seeking to form a special purpose vehicle with Pengurusan Aset Air Bhd (PAAB), a wholly-owned company under the Minister of Finance Incorporated, to take over the country’s water assets, The Edge Financial Daily reported today.
Muhyiddin, who is also deputy prime minister, also told reporters earlier today that the proposed Langat 2 water treatment plant was important to prevent Selangor, Kuala Lumpur and Putrajaya from reaching critical water supply levels by 2014.
He said the federal government will refer the Selangor government’s planned takeover of Syabas to the Attorney-General as it involved legal technicalities.
The Selangor government has also said it will pay to upgrade two water treatment plants to increase water supply if Putrajaya continued to delay transferring RM225 million for the project.
The two plants, Sungai Selangor Plant 1 (SSP1) and Sungai Selangor Plant 2 (SSP2), are currently running below their maximum capacity output due to infrastructural limitations to channel treated water out to the water supply network.- malaysian insider
Putrajaya stops S'gor takeover of Syabas...
The special cabinet committee on the Selangor water issue agreed at its meeting that there are "substantial and procedural" matters that have not been met to allow Selangor to takeover Syabas.
However, Deputy Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin said the final decision would be made after the attorney-general deliberates on the matter.
"He has been instructed to call a meeting on this matter this afternoon," he said after chairing a three-hour meeting in Putrajaya today.
Among the issues stand in the way of the takeover, he said, is the state government's failure to compensate Syabas after refusing a scheduled increase in the water tariff.
"The matter is now pending in court as Syabas is suing Selangor," he said.
Selangor had in 2009 refused to allow water tariffs to go up unless Syabas reduced its non-revenue water which currently involves one-third of supply.
Asked why Selangor was not invited to attend the discussion today, Muhyiddin said this was a federal-level meeting.
"There are several matters which will have to involve Selangor but so far, this is (within) our scope of power," he said.
The committee came to the decision after consultations with the Energy, Green Technology and Water and National Water Services Commission.- malaysiakini
Now, Muhyiddin says no need for water-rationing
Federal gov't lets Syabas hold people to ransom
By barring Selangor from taking charge of Syarikat Bekalan Air Selangor (Syabas), the special cabinet committee is allowing the water concessionaire to hold people of the state to ransom.
It
seems the federal government is more interested in supporting a crony
company like Syabas, whose chairperson Rozali Ismail was a former
Selangor Umno treasurer, state executive councillor Dr Xavier Jayakumar
told a press conference today. "This, rather than looking after the interests of the Selangor rakyat as a whole, especially on a vital issue such as water," Xavier said in blasting the cabinet committee after visiting the Sungai Semenyih water treatment plant.
Committee chairperson and Deputy Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin said earlier today the federal government has made an initial decision not to allow the Selangor government to take over the operations of Syabas.
'Syabas committing criminal contempt' Muhyiddin also said that there was no cause at present to ration water supply to Selangor and the surrounding areas of the Federal Territories.
Xavier said Muhyiddin's admission that there was no need for water rationing proved that Syabas had been committing a criminal contempt.
"It proves that Syabas created the crisis.
"If the (special) cabinet committee says that there is no need for rationing water and there is no problem of pure water supply, than I hold Syabas for a criminal contempt in the terms of frightening the people of Selangor and talking about rationing the water," he added.- malaysiakini
RM5.1 mil saved annually if SYABAS boss removed...
The Selangor state government has proposed to sack the top duo of controversial private water concessionaire Syarikat Bekalan Air Selangor (SYABAS) after the company failed to provide a satisfactory answer to the state’s SYABAS monitoring committee on recent claims of a 'water crisis' in the state.Menteri Besar Khalid Ibrahim said the dismissal of SYABAS executive chairman Rozali Ismail (pic) alone would save close to RM5.1 million annually.
Besides Rozali, SYABAS’s chief executive officer Ruslan Hassan has also been cited for failing to explain to the newly formed SYABAS monitoring committee.
“The state government is prepared to spend an allocation for new water treatment plant aiming to increase the capacity of treated water and immediately calls for tenders for the Second Mitigation project worth RM225 million,” added Khalid.
Following the proposal for water rationing, Khalid ordered the setting up of monitoring committee to oversee SYABAS. The committee among others demanded SYABAS to provide details of daily water output for each treatment plant as well as water level at dams, water demand based on metered consumption from January 2012 to date and water demand as forecasted by SYABAS.
The committee also wants SYABAS to furnish details on balancing reservoir, terminal reservoir and service reservoir’s water levels, areas affected by water disruptions and information on main pipe networks which include dams and problematic areas and non-revenue water (NRW).
SYABAS was also asked to explain the cause of supply problems, solutions and its emergency response plans.
Following three days of observation, the committee concluded that Rozali and Ruslan should be sacked.
Khalid said the two proposals were made in the people's interest as SYABAS had failed to provide adequate clean water supply as stipulated in the concessionaire agreement.-harakahdaily
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