Syabas rebuts water crisis allegations, point-by-point

Syarikat Bekalan Air Selangor (Syabas) at a press conference yesterday rebutted all the allegations over the water crisis in Selangor made against it by the state government and Pakatan Rakyat leaders.

With the row over who should be responsible for the crisis that has troubled more than 100,000 Klang Valley residents becoming increasingly complicated, Malaysiakini compiled the explanation from Syabas technical development executive director V Subramaniam in a simpler format, based on a news report in today issue of Sinar Harian.

Allegation: Syabas failed to carry out regular maintenance of the variable speed drive (VSD) of the Wangsa Maju pump house because it does not have any maintenance contracts with the VSD supplier. Syabas calls the supplier for maintenance only when there are problems.

Rebuttal: The water pumps failed because they have been operating beyond their capacities for too long to meet the increasing water demand while waiting additional sources of treated water, which have not been provided by the state government.

The maintenance of the pumps have been carried out regularly by Syabas personnel every month. During the maintenance, we obtain the services of experts and the VSD supplier ABB Malaysia Sdn Bhd, if necessary.

We have documents to prove all the maintenance works done on the pump house. Copies of the documents has also been submitted to the National Water Services Commission (Span), which has established a special committee to audit the maintenance works.

Allegation: One of the five pumps in the Wangsa Maju pump house had already reported to be faulty since last year but had not been repaired.

Rebuttal: The real reason for the pump failure is long-time overloading and repeated breakdowns. The breakdown of the pump house was caused by breakdown in electrical and electronic components.

The particular pump always encountered breakdowns on its VSD, and it has been repaired every time by ABB as the manufacturer and supplier of VSD as this repair can only be done by the experts from the company.

The repairs were frequent and took a long time. However, during that period, the pump house was still supplying water exceeding the consumers' demand.

Allegation: Throughout 2012, there were only 18 days when the pumps operated beyond the capacity of 200 million litres a day.

Rebuttal: We have records and statistics to show that the pumps at the Wangsa Maju pump house had operated over 200 million litres a day on 2,023 times in 2012.

Allegation: The state government is aware of the problem of frequent breakdowns and had reminded Syabas, but no action had been taken.

Rebuttal: We have never received any reminder in written or verbal form from the state government.

Allegation: Syabas claimed it has insufficient funds to repair the pumps because the state government had stopped it from increasing the water tariffs.

Rebuttal: We have never made such statement.

Allegation: Syabas submitted an application to develop an additional pump system in Wangsa Maju in November last year and the state government supported it early this year.

Rebuttal: The proposal was submitted to the federal government in June 2009 and brought to the Selangor Menteri Besar's office in January 2010, but there had been no response until March 2012, when the federal government decided to approve the proposal and provide a loan to the state government to fund the construction of the additional pump house.

If the pump house had been constructed, it would have been able to supply 120 million litres of water a day and lighten the burden on the current water pumps.

Allegation: Syabas failed to prepare enough back-up water supply for the residents and did not have a contingency plan to address the crisis.

Rebuttal: We could not have a back-up water supply because the reserve capacity was only one percent, way below the industry standard of 20 percent. The responsibility to have sufficient water reserves lies with the state government, not Syabas.

Allegation: The crisis shows that Puncak Niaga Sdn Bhd (PNSB) and Syabas are incompetent in managing the water supply.

Rebuttal: The state government's insistence in rejecting the Langat 2 water treatment plant and the delay in constructing the additional pump house caused Syabas to operate the pump house beyond its capacity.

The allegation against PNSB is unfair because the company is not involved in this.