DBKL, diarrhoea and Raja Nong Chik: Giving up Lembah Pantai for Titiwangsa?

Walking past Bangsar’s Telawi Streets, where most of the favoured eateries are located, one is reminded of the Old West where anything goes. None of the establishments appear to feel compelled to follow any rules.

There are chairs and tables on the sidewalk, some, incredibly, permanently cast in concrete! If you were to trip over one of these and fall, who would be liable? The restaurant? DBKL? They would all be pointing fingers. Some have huge plants in front of them. So if a centipede or a cobra were to crawl out and bite some passer-by, who would be responsible? We suppose DBKL would deny ever knowing about this. We know they know, because they hand out parking tickets often enough in this part of town. So why will they not act?

How to spread diarrhoea

There should be nothing on the sidewalk; that’s why its called a sidewalk. Tables and chairs and inebriated customers belong in the restaurant. As do gaudy cement elephants and huge cement tables and, good grief, fountains! Fountains on the sidewalk!?

If that isn’t bad enough, visit one of the few, but popular, Indian restaurants in Bangsar and you will be shocked at the state of their kitchens. The Health Department in DBKL is clearly comatose or worse. One restaurant has diluted blood streaming out the back drain! Forget the sensitive customer, it is plain unhealthy. Waiters freely use their hands to touch your food before serving it! A great way to get faeces in your food, and bacteria in your belly.

It all comes back to enforcement, which responsibility lies with DBKL, which responsibility they are ignoring. DBKL has a Datuk Bandar, not elected by the people; generally a tired old civil servant about to retire. He could care less about the residents of KL, we suppose, as he swings his golf club in some green fairway.

And the real culprits?

The Nong Chik

The Federal Territories Minister and his deputy of course! Raja Nong Chik has the gall to send out Hari Raya messages to everybodys handphone, and recently an invitation to attend an open house for Lembah Pantai residents, yet we have no idea what he has done for KL since taking office. His deputy has managed to turn Brickfields into a mixed-up mess with a gaudy monstrosity of an elephant fountain right in the middle, and awful colors everywhere else.

The FT Minister should focus on his current job and make sure DBKL is properly run; instead of spending his time campaigning for Lembah Pantai, where he does stand a chance against PKR vice president Nurul Izzah Anwar.

Even his Umno mates know this and they have advised him to give it up. Go to Titiwangsa and challenge PAS for the seat. But the way things are going, it looks like fat chance for him there too!

A nice lady

Titiwangsa still remembers Dr Lo'Lo' Ghazali, who died of lung cancer in July at age 54. A medical doctor, Lo'Lo' became the second woman from PAS to win a parliamentary seat when she beat Barisan's Aziz Jamaludin Mohd Tahir by a majority of 1,972 votes in the 2008 general election.

But if Umno is banking on the narrow margin of Lo'Lo's win, they had better think twice. In the short few years since taking over the constituency, Lo'Lo' has been able to strike a rapport with the people there.

“Even on her deathbed my mother continued to worry about the people in her constituency,” said her son Muhd Fawwaz.

And even Umno nastie, Rembau MP Khairy Jamaluddin, had a kind word to spare when he heard of her death. "She was a nice lady."

Nonetheless, the nondescript Nong Chik does not have all the choices in the world. A below par administrator, he is lucky to have been recalled to the Cabinet, Umno veterans say.

So it looks like Nong Chik's time in Lembah Pantai, trying to stir up a storm for the young but steely Izzah, may have been wasted. It's now off to Titiwangsa, so don't be surprised to bump into him, stirring up trouble for Lo'Lo's family and PAS the next time you are in the area.

- Malaysia Chronicle