The suggestion by Putrajaya Holdings Sdn Bhd senior manager Najmuddin Mat Daud that the recent flooding of the immigration office in Kuala Lumpur could be due to poor maintenance of the piping system does not seem plausible.

His assertion that the incident is not due to shoddy workmanship and poor installation of the pipes is, at best, only his opinion. It must be pointed out that the pipes were fitted less than three years ago. What kind of maintenance is needed for pipes to prevent them from falling apart at the joints?

If, as he says, the quality of the pipes (which have been certified by Sirim) is not in question, it is all the more probable that the root cause of the problem can be found in the workmanship.

It would be interesting to know what measures are in place to ensure that the installation of the pipes is done by competent personnel? What quality control measures were in place to ensure that the installation works had been done to quality specifications? In the first place, are there any specifications for good workmanship for pipe installation works, in practice?

In all likelihood, what happened was that the pipe works was done by a subcontractor (or a sub-subcontractor) of WTC Engineering Berhad, which had been appointed to build the office. Nevertheless, the selection and control and evaluation of vendors is the responsibility of Putrajaya Holdings Sdn Bhd.

Putrajaya Holdings should not try to absolve itself of any responsibility for the debacle, before conducting a proper root cause analysis of the problem. It should examine the records of pipe installation works that had been done, including quality checks carried out, as well as the competencies of the relevant personnel, before pointing the finger at PWD and the contractor appointed to carry out maintenance of the building.

Another aspect that needs to be looked into is the liability period for new buildings. It is less than two years since the building was handed over to PWD (on May 1, 2005) by Putrajaya Holdings. Surely it is not too much to expect a building costing millions of ringgit, to be defect free for at least two years?

While it is commendable that PWD has decided to carry out preventive inspection of the water piping system, it is also incumbent on Putrajaya Holdings to carry out a proper analysis of what went wrong so that appropriate corrective and preventive action can be taken.