Access to water as a fundamental human right. This is because adequate quantity of water of sufficient quality is required to maintain human health and well being. Consumers should have access to clean, safe and uninterrupted water supply at affordable price at all times.

Therefore, understanding that water is a fundamental human need, all relevant parties should investigate and provide a detailed report on the cause of the smelly water supplied to consumers as well as the health hazards, which may increase through the consumption of the water supplied. We would like to also suggest that the report should be summarized and published in the newspapers for public information. This will amplify the transparency and accountability of the government and the private concessionaires involved.

The scenario of last week would have been a cause of leachate from the Bukit Tagar landfill, activities along the river or other unknown causes. While the relevant authorities are still finding the major cause, measure should be taken to safe guard our water resources.

Immediate action should be taken on the following matters:

1. Management of Rivers in Malaysia

97% of the Malaysian water resources are from the rivers. Bukit Tagar is situated between Sungai Tenggi water catchment area which feeds the padi fields in Sekinchan and Kuala Selangor and Sungai Selangor, which supplies 60% of the drinking water consumed in Selangor, Putrajaya and Kuala Lumpur.

All relevant parties should work together in planning and implementation of a major river rehabilitation programme, which will ensure the cleanliness and sustainability of the river system. Apart from that, understanding the importance of the rivers as water source, the proposed river privatization programme in Selangor should be rejected. This is to ensure that the water resource will not be further polluted and manipulated by the private companies.

2. Control of activities along and around the rivers

Water contamination and deterioration of the water quality is always affiliated to the activities around the rivers. For example, the recent scenario highlighted the small industries, dairy farms, oxidation ponds and palm oil mills as one of the factors contributing to the high level of ammonia in the Sungai Selangor. Apart from that, the leachate from the Bukit Tagar landfill was also concluded as the main source.

Therefore, we should re-examine and control the activities along and around the rivers, dams and water intake points to maintain the sustainability of the river as a water resource as well as to maintain the quality of the river water. This includes prohibiting any factories, industries, animal breeding farms, development which will allow sedimentation and oxidation ponds to be located along the rivers.

Furthermore, we should also review all incinerator and landfill projects (existing and new ones) to avoid any of these projects in and around the river area. One of the best examples are the proposed Broga incinerator which is located near the Sungai Seringgit which flows to the Sungai Semenyih which is a water intake point for consumers in Klang Valley. We hope that the Ministry will learn from its current experience and avoid repetition of similar problems in future.

Polluting our water resources is akin to poisoning one's self, and many others, slowly. Water Catchment areas are most definitely not the place to construct landfills or incinerators.

3. Provide information to public on water quality

Water is fundamental human right as well as basic necessity; therefore public should be informed and kept updated on many issues related to the water industry. In the recent case, the various authorities have given various reasons on the cause of the foul-smelly water supplied to consumers. The Ministry should work out a plan to upgrade the integration of all responsible agencies as well as to create a mechanism to ensure continuous information to the public and consumers.

4. Water Resources Management

Malaysia is a country with abundance of water, however recently it has been facing water scarcity that is deemed to be caused by lack of integrated water management schemes. The proposed Suruhanjaya Perkhidmatan Air Negara shall undertake the responsibility of this work and therefore we propose that the SPAN bill should include Integrated Water Resources Management as one of the Commission's functions.

Local NGOs residents associations and community should be given education, training and capacity building to act as the watch dog for the SPAN in monitoring rivers around their residential areas.

5. Environmental Impact Assessment

The procedures to conduct EIA and Detailed EIA (DEIA) should be tightened to ensure that the project managers and developers strictly follow the rule and procedures in the application of approval of EIA especially for critical project such as the landfills, incinerators and project with multiple environmental effects.

In July 2004, before the proposed Bukit Tagar landfill was approved by the, Selangor Menteri Besar, DOE and residents around the area has requested the Ministry of Housing and Local Government to reconsider the project, however the Ministry went ahead and placed the landfill under federal jurisdiction. Today the problems arising could have been avoided if the relevant authority studies the project EIA carefully and took into consideration of the Selangor Government and DOE's concerns.

An independent EIA panel should be set up to study and provide comments on the EIA's submitted before it is approved. This panel should consist of NGO's and civil society leaders (including the residents leader of the proposed project area)

6. Amendment of the EQA 1974

Regulation on Waste Water and Industrial Effluents1979 in the Environmental Quality Act 1974, is deemed to be not comprehensive enough as it only include 23 parameters which does not include ammonia and other substance as to ensure the quality of the treated water. Therefore we urge the Ministry to review and upgrade the regulation to include parameter such as ammonia in the list.

7. Review the Concession Agreement of Syabas and other water supply companies

From the recent foul and smelly water issues, it is noticed that Syabas has clearly stated that the company does not hold the responsibility of water treatment and the concession has only stated about water supply. There are statements made by the Department of Environment stating that the company has no facilities to threat ammonia in water.

We urge the federal government to review the concession agreement between the federal government and Syabas as well as other private water supply concessionaires. This is to ensure that the water supply concessionaires hold the responsibility to supply, clean, safe, uninterrupted water at affordable price to consumers.

8. Holistic approach by all relevant agencies

In the recent case, consumers were confused by the different statements made by the different government agencies on the foul and smelly water supplied to consumers. We would like to reiterate that water is a fundamental basic need and therefore there should be a clear mechanism and holistic approach in dealing with issues related to water management and supply.

All eight principles highlighted in the National Policy on Environment evolves around the stewardship of the environment, continuous improvement in quality of the environment and sustainable use of natural resources.

Therefore we hope that measures will be taken to ensure the effectiveness of the National Policy on Environment to further enhance the environmental quality for the betterment of the people.

LOGA SUNTHRI VEERAIAH is manager of Environment Federation of the Malaysian Consumers Association (Fomca).