Kedah calls for probe into faulty opening of control gate at Sungai Muda

 

The control gate opened without warning last Saturday, causing the water level in Sungai Muda to drop to 0.67m from 1.85m. (PBAPP pic)

ALOR SETAR: The Kedah government wants an investigation to be conducted over the faulty opening of a control gate at Ampang Jajar Sungai Muda last Saturday which caused a sudden drop in the water level of Sungai Muda.

Menteri besar Sanusi Nor said if necessary, an investigation committee should be set up by the natural resources, environment and climate change ministry and the results of the probe should be made public.

“Action should be taken against the parties responsible, particularly those on duty at the time, because at 10pm (Saturday), Sada (Syarikat Air Darul Aman Sdn Bhd) alerted in a Whatsapp group consisting of agencies managing the river’s water level and barrage gate that the Sungai Muda water level was dropping.

“At midnight, Sada again alerted them that the river’s water level was dropping, but it was only at 7am the next day that they shut down the gate manually,” he said at a press conference at Wisma Darul Aman here today.

The Ampang Jajar Sungai Muda has 14 control gates that will be opened and closed as needed to control the release of water for flood control and tidal operations.

Sanusi said seven of the gates were not functioning. However, he said, this did not affect the water level of the river as the faulty gates were closed.

However, he said the gate that opened without warning last Saturday was due to a technical malfunction in the supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) system.

“I understand that RM8.5 million has been allocated for the replacement of a new machine to control the gate,” he added.

Meanwhile, Kedah Umno information head Shaiful Hazizy Zainol Abidin also called for the National Water Services Commission (SPAN) to investigate the incident, which he believed was due to human negligence.

He said the incident also proved that the state and the federal governments needed to have a good relationship.

“It also proved that the state government is not capable of solving problems in silo or alone,” he said in a statement today.

According to the natural resources, environment and climate change ministry in a statement yesterday, the control gate opened without warning last Saturday, causing the water level in Sungai Muda to drop to 0.67m from 1.85m. Action was taken to close the gate manually at 7.30am the following day.

On Sunday, Bernama reported that about 252,000 user accounts in three districts, namely Kuala Muda, Kulim and parts of Baling were affected by unscheduled water supply disruption due to the sudden drop in the water level at Sungai Muda. - FMT