DAP calls on the Barisan Nasional Government to ensure that the 17,000 people affected by the UEM’s $2.3 billion Second Johore-Singapore Link project become beneficiaries and not victims of development

By Parliamentary Opposition Leader, DAP Secretary-General and MP for Tanjung, Lim Kit Siang, in Petaling Jaya on Sunday, November 24, 1991:

DAP calls on the Barisan Nasional Government to ensure that the 17,000 people affected by the UEM’s $2.3 billion Second Johore-Singapore Link project become beneficiaries and not victims of development.

Yesterday, accompanied by Johore DAP State Chairman, S.K. Song, DAP Assemblyman for Jementah, Wong Peng Seng, Ungku Tun Aminah DAP Branch Leaders, and Pulai Semangat 46 leaders, I visited the Malay kampongs in Gelang Patah which will be affected by the UEM’s $2.3 billion Second Johore-Singapore project.

Some of the Malay kampongs we visited were Kampong Ladang, Tanjung Kupang, Kampong Pendas Laut, Kampong Pok, Kampong Tanjung Adang, Kampong Pekajang and Gelang Patah.

We also visited the site at Tanjung Kupang opposite Tuas in Singapore which has been selected as the site for the Second Link in Johore.

From our visit, it is clear that the 17,000 people who will be affected by the UEM’s Second Link Project are full of anxiety and uncertainty about their future, their livelihood and whether thay could preserve their traditional kampong way of life.

DAP calls on the Barisan Nasional Government to ensure that the 17,000 people affected by the UEM’s $2.3 billion Second Johore-Singapore Link project become beneficiaries and not victims of development.

In implementing the Second Link project, the barisan Nasional government and UEM should fully legitimate rights and demands of the 17,000 people in the 19 kampongs affected by the project.

The people in the 19 kampongs have good reason to be worried that instead of becoming beneficiaries of development, they will become the victims, with all the fruits of development accruing only to UEM and the handful who are the real owners of UEM.

UMNO leaders mislead the people of Gelang Patah about the UEM’s decision to site the Second Link during last year’s general elections.

Their worries and fear stem from the following factors:

Firstly, the UMNO leaders mislead the people of Gelang Patah about the UEM’s decision to site the Second Link in their area during the general elections last year.

The decision to site the UEM’s Second Link project in Gelang Patah was taken by the UMNO leaders and UEM before the October general elections last year. However the UMNO leaders deliberately mislead the people of Gelang Patah by hiding this decision from their knowledge, and the Information Minister, Datuk Mohamed Rahmat, who was seeking re-election as MP for Pulai, even promised during the general elections campaign that he would not allow the land of the Malay kampongs to be acquired.

Immediately after the October general elections, the UMNO leaders made public that the UEM’s Second Link would be sited in Gelang Patah.

Secondly, the UMNO leaders had completely ignored the feelings and rights of the people in the 19 kampongs in Gelang patah to be consulted in a project which would involve the dispossession of their tanah pusaka, the loss of their present means of livelihood and the destruction of their traditional kampong way of life.

I was told during my visit yesterday that some of the kampongs have a history which go as far as 200 years.

When asked by some kampong people in Gelang Patah what would be their future after their land had been taken by UEM, one State UMNO leader told them that it was their problem to seek a new way of life after they had been paid compensation by UEM.

Thirdly, the low compensation offered for acquisition of the 26,000 hectares required by UEM for the Second Link and a new township project.

The kampong people are told by UMNO leaders that they would be offered $17,000 per hectare – when some kampong land in the area are being offered ten times this amount at the market price.

The Kampong people are very bitter and opposed to this compensation offer as it would not enable a household with an average of five acres, getting about $34,000, to establish a new life. As we were told during our visit yesterday, a low-cost house is already $25,000 to $30,000 in Johore Bahru – and what would be lost is not just their tanah ousaka, but their livelihood and the traditional kampong way of life.

DAP calls on UMNO leaders to reveal what profit would be made by UEM in the Second Link and new Township project.

It is most unfair to the 19 kampongs in Gelang Patah that the Barisan Nasional government specially amended the Land Acquisition Act in Parliament to disallow the kampong people to challenge the land acquisition for the UEM’s Second Link project in a court of law.

DAP calls on the UMNO leaders to make public the profit the UEM is expected to make from the Second Link and new Township project, and to ensure that apart from fair compensation for any land acquired in Gelang Patah, the 17,000 people share in the benefit and profits of the UEM’s privatization and development programme in Gelang Patah.

The DAP will give full support to the people in the 19 kampongs in Gelang Patah to ensure that they are justly treated by the Barisan Nasional Government and the UEM, and that they do not become victims of UEM privatization and development.

The DAP has set up a special committee to study the problems of the people of Gelang Patah arising from the UEM’s Second Link project. This DAP Second Link special committee will be headed by Yong Pei Keng, lawyer, and will work closely with Semangat 46 Pualai Second Link Action Committee to ensure that the people of Gelang Patah get a just and fair deal.