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‘Punishment’ that rewards, enriches and emboldens

Penang state executive councillor Chow Kon Yeow couldn’t have been serious when he said that the developer who demolished the colonial era mansion at 20 Pykett Avenue, Penang before the state could gazette it as a heritage building “had been punished enough since it had waited for four years.” This actually sounds cynical.

The developer, Klassik Tropika, had been fined a pittance sum of RM 6,000 for the demolition of the historical/heritage bungalow. After the demolition, when Penangites questioned it and raised protests, the then-Penang Municipal Council (MPPP) issued an order to the developer on Feb 11, 2011 to rebuild it.

The rebuild order was never carried out and no action was taken to enforce it. If there was no intention to enforce it, why was it issued in the first place? Doesn’t this make a mockery of the order, and of those who issued it?     

The MPPP does not seem to have had any intention to enforce the rebuild order for after four years of lying low, news has surfaced that the developer has been granted planning approval to build 294 condos towering more than 30 storeys, in a neighbourhood of double-storey houses which has existed for more than 50 years!

Chow Kon Yeow then comes up with a novel defense of the approval. He said:

a) The developer had been punished enough with the RM6,000.00 fine and four-year delay in developing the land,

b) Had the developer re-built the bungalow, he would have applied for permission to demolish it (meaning he would have complied with the law).

Chow Kon Yeow seems to be saying that the local authority (now the Penang Island City Council or MBPP) would have had to approve the developer’s application to demolish the re-built bungalow! Is this correct? If so, then wasn’t it wrong in the first place to issue the re-build order? Why was that done - to fool Penangites?

Instead of playing games, Penangites should have been told that there was no way the developer could be compelled to re-build the demolished bungalow, and at best the local authority would use its powers to freeze the planning approval for four years.  

The so-called punishment is actually a reward for this developer and a license to others to do the same. Having waited for four years, he is likely to make more money as property prices have appreciated. How many percent of the increased profits that will be made is the RM6,000.00 fine that he paid?   

The authorities are sending a clear but wrong message to the developers - that they will be let off (in fact rewarded) for snubbing any orders issued against them.

So what value are the authorities’ orders to developers if not just to placate the man in the street, to fool him?

If the rebuild order was issued to this developer with the intention that the historical bungalow should stand for posterity, then the development approval for the 30-storey condo on the bungalow’s site should be rescinded. Chow Kon Yeow’s classic defense that the developer “had been punished enough since it had waited for four years” is then not tenable. Otherwise, it was plain dishonesty in issuing the rebuild order.

The local authority should act with dignity.

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