The state of Kota Damansara – deplorable!

It seems that Kota Damansara has been, more or less, neglected by the local authority, Majlis Perbandaran Petaling Jaya (MBPJ) in the last five years simply because the seat was in the hands of the state opposition, BN.

There is an issue with many local authorities across Selangor and perhaps, across the country too, especially after GE14. Conflicts between supporters of the two camps, BN and Pakatan Harapan has been quite glaring, at least in MBPJ.

Many areas such as Kota Damansara and some other parts of Selangor, suffered as a result of this internal conflicts. In the case of MBPJ, some of the officers are not that pro-active, to begin with.

They seldom take the initiatives to go down to the ground to see and get first-hand information from the residents' associations (RAs) or attend to the complaints. This work attitude cannot be seen as doing a good job.

I am told that quite a number of them simply do not want to perform for a Harapan-led state government. Unless Harapan can find ways to get rid of them, this problem will persist for many years to come with or without local elections. This is an issue in the management of local authorities.

That is why areas such as Kota Damansara become worse off, with hardly any representation apart from a few appointed councillors to service a fairly large area of about 50,438 voters.

In such areas, the appointment of the right persons as local councillors becomes important and crucial in order to ensure that local government delivers what they are supposed to do.

Anyway, there is a lot of catching up to do for the new state assemblyperson for Kota Damansara. I would suggest that he start by going back to the record of complaints over the last couple of years.

Most of the complaints lodged by the residents through the previous state assemblyperson seemed to have fallen on deaf ears as far as the Majlis was concerned. I believe there are records available of these complaints in MBPJ.

Daily issues such as rubbish scattered all over the place are very common.
And this is not a new issue either. The surrounding areas are full of uncollected rubbish and dirty eateries. These dirty eateries and the many clogged up drains in the area have given rise to an increase in the population of rats, which again, has not been tackled by the Majlis.

If MBPJ officers can shut three eateries in Jalan Gasing, I cannot see why a similar and thorough inspection of eateries in Kota Damansara cannot be carried out. They are a lot worse here with rats running all over, let alone roaches, especially at night.

Please look at the rubbish collection operations, its schedule and the daily collection process, if any. Please bring in the contractors and clear the clogged up drains that that have not been cleaned in the last five years.

Then, please look into issues of the missing manhole covers. These are fairly standard issues for many other local authorities so please do not wait for complaints to be lodged before action is taken.

Other big issues revolve around illegal roadside stalls, illegal immigrants running shops and eateries, poor living conditions surrounding the low-cost flats and road safety issues across many sections in Kota Damansara.

These problems have been there and were never looked into for the past many years. Harapan councillors need to introduce and inculcate a clean approach to the environment and where would be a better place to start but at the newly-won seat of Kota Damansara?

My suggestion is that once this constituency is all cleaned up and our own houses (seats) are in order, then we can start talking about other pertinent issues that matter to the state. Without a clean and green environment, other issues take a back seat. -Mkini