Sarawak Latest News

THE weather hasn’t exactly been at its best as expected over the Chinese New Year period (What can you expect when incessant rain coincided with the King Tide, which the Sarawak Almanac so accurately stated would come at the given times?)

Depending on where you live, it is a boon or bane, or both. But it is not the usual thing to be visited upon twice, with all roads cut off within a short span of time, by flood waters that rose to two to three feet deep outside the house or a few inches or more on the ground floor.

Pity those who live in Bau, totally cut off for a few days when the only road out of the district was under several feet of water after the river overflowed its banks.

I suppose most people who have lived in the same old place have learnt to accept that fact of life. Selling the old house to buy a new one somewhere else, which you think might not get flooded is (to me) like trying to escape from a problem.

A family friend from the Ulu who is used to such visitation by divine intervention, as he would put it, can always turn to a boat with a 25hp engine, powerful enough to go against the currents and to reach the nearest dry land. It can be fun for the family, but not to many of us living in the city.

Many of us woke up on Sunday morning a fortnight ago, horrified to find that the big open space designed as a council public park outside had turned into a lake!

Pity the owners of the single storey terrace houses living across as they were under two feet of water, and the damage was evident several days later when they tried to dispose of damaged mattresses and wooden furniture.

The owners left them outside, next to Trienekens garbage containers, thinking the regular pick-up men would do the job.

No. Not this type of rubbish for the green truck. After several days, the affected house owners had little choice but to hire a pickup truck to remove the discarded household items.

Maybe the owners could have called up the company and negotiated or maybe the Trienekens men could have offered some suggestions and even help take away the discarded household items for a small fee, as a public service.

I am wondering whose responsibility it is to remove the debris left behind by the receding floodwaters at the roadsides and open spaces in front of many residential areas. The local council or house owners? As house owners, we do pay assessment rates and expect such services to be rendered by the local council.

True, these are small things but small things add up to become big things, and could become big issues too, which some politicians would love to pick up.

My friend CM Ong and I were driving in his four-wheel drive along the main Batu Kawa Road on the day many parts of Kuching city were under water. Parts of the highway were almost impassable as they were under a foot of water near the traffic lights, just before Petronas station in Batu Kawa.

We thought it would have helped traffic flow if either PWD or the local council had sent trucks to place some stones to raise the road as a temporary solution, instead of allowing long queues of almost motionless traffic to form.

You can be sure that when traffic lights are down, it is unlikely that anyone would spring up to direct the heavy traffic. They’d probably feel it’s too wet or cold to be out there, standing in the middle of the road, directing the traffic while technicians are summoned to fix the traffic lights.

Would they come if you call them at the numbers displayed nearby? Hardly.

I am writing this in the backroom, which is my office of sort overlooking the back garden, beyond which is the heavily overcast sky at almost noon time. I had just got back from town, using what I would call Hacienda Road (thanks to Peter Kuek, the guy who used to operate the joint in the middle of nowhere a long time ago) near Sky Garden in Kuching. Parts of that road near the houses and shophouses were submerged in water.

The water level at Sungai Maong was also rising and soon to overflow its banks. The first affected houses would be those built close to the river.

A friend bought a piece of land nearby and built a nice house on it, believing it would never be flooded. Well, he was wrong. On FLOOD DAY, he rang up to say he couldn’t get out of his house! His house is near Chung Hua School No. 6, a place that is prone to floods from the frequent overflowing of nearby Sungai Maong.

The question everyone is asking is: What is the solution to the perennial problem? The Barrage or build a well-planned central sewerage system across Kuching city? Expensive, yes. But it has to be done, now or later. Of course, that is no solution should the seawater suddenly rise and flood the neighbouring areas due to some earth movement or for whatever scientific reason.

The likes of the recent floods in Jalan Padungan had never been seen before this, according to the affected shopkeepers. One ground floor shop selling household provisions and newspapers was under two feet of water. A week later when I went to buy a newspaper, the damage caused by the flood was still evident.

Almost everyone saw how bad the flood was. Yes, it is close to Sungai Sarawak. But we are supposed to have a barrage that can help get rid of the accumulated floodwater quickly. What happened? Was the barrage being manned at that time? Were the gates opened when it rained overnight upcountry and coincided with the King Tide?

Perhaps the authorities concerned should come up with a plausible explanation as to why after the heavy rain and King Tide, the old town centres were flooded as were many other parts of Kuching city.

It’s not enough to announce that a new river diversion channel is going to be built at a cost of RM130 million or more and that it should help solve the flood problems. Would it really? Planning is either too late and too little, or there is little planning to handle what officials call ‘flood mitigation problems’.

We must come clean to tell the rakyat just where the problems are, and whether this is being tackled and how. Otherwise questions remain indefinitely.

I remember that Violet Yong, the DAP assemblywoman for Pending, raised the issue in the State Legislative Assembly some time ago, but whether the minister responsible had responded or whether his reply had been publicised at all, I am not sure. Other elected opposition representatives also raised the same questions, reflecting the concerns of their constituents. Rightly so.

Without any concrete and positive measures being taken, we are going to face the same or even more serious problems in the years ahead with no real solution in sight. More land is being taken up by houses, shops, offices and schools, and the result is easily predictable if the drainage system is practically non-existent or remains in its present state and if there do not exist a properly-planned and well-developed central sewerage system (as we see in big cities like Singapore, KL, Hong Kong, Taipei, Tokyo and Seoul and even New York and London).

It is often said that the weather is ever so unpredictable. True. How do we forecast the unpredictability? Can we really? The degree of accuracy is probably more uncertain than to tell when the world is going to get out of its present economic and financial crisis, and when tens of thousands who have lost their factory jobs are going to get them back.

If there is consolation to some people, however, it is that there is a Chinese belief that water can also bring good luck.

So some people actually welcome the sight of water, especially before the Chinese New Year, believing it to be a good omen! The time, day, date and year it happened are good numbers for some punters too! The 6/49 and 6/52 provide enough space for all the numbers! .. But Im not played the number.. Haram for Muslim

It is also said that rain is sometimes followed by fire, and fire has many signs which can be interpreted in many ways too.

It’s still raining heavily outside since morning where I live.

Difficult to tell when it will end but I have to end now. Before I do let us wish those celebrating a wet CNY all the best for the Year of the Ox.