COMMENT The Forest Research Institute of Malaysia (Frim) deserves to be complimented for the manner in which they handled both the media and public complaints.

A week ago, I highlighted a complaint from a personal friend from a local church, whose senior citizens and young children were refused entry into Frim’s private campus.

On the night when the article was written, I got in touch with its director-general, Dr Abdul Latif Mohmod, via email. Despite it being nearly midnight, Dr Latif was still checking his emails and replied to my query about the incident.

After hearing about the complaint, Dr Latif did the right thing. He apologised on behalf of Frim for the incident which had caused the aggrieved party some unnecessary hassles when they were turned away by the security guards.

He promised an investigation would be carried out immediately. Several days later, I decided to release the article while waiting for the official response.

Misunderstanding dealt with

A response came from a senior staff member at Frim in a subsequent email which explains in detail the process to register groups of more than 10 people.

Although Frim had initially defended the security guards, saying that “they were at all times courteous while discharging their duties as instructed”, it was acknowledged later that the guards had been rather impolite, and to some extent, intimidating to the visitors.

According to the feedback received, one of the security guard had in fact told the group, “If you are not happy, leave the place.” When a smaller group of fewer than 10 had gone into Frim’s Botanical Gardens, they were also told to leave the place.

There was no flexibility considering it was a much smaller group involving only the children.

Admittedly, there was also the confusion over the need to register the group at least three days in advance, which Frim later realised was a mistake made by its security guards.

The guidelines published on Frim’s website had merely stated that “any gathering of visitors or any group activity involving more than 10 people must be registered with the Frim One Stop Centre before the gathering/activity.”

The Frim representatives, however, explained that they have a responsibility to protect the man-made forest from being destroyed by joggers, cyclists and other visitors as well as to safeguard the safety of the visitors.

This was well-received by Pastor Ong, who said her church would be keen to organise another trip to help clean up the forest reserve and help to plant more trees. “We agree this is a joint responsibility since Frim has opened its door to the public,” she said.

Had there been a Frim jungle guide, the group would have enjoyed the morning walk without any qualms. An earlier date of registration would have ensured that Frim contact its freelance guides to take the group on the morning expedition.

The fees charged by the volunteer guides are in fact very reasonable when the cost is shared out, in exchange for a wealth of knowledge these freelance jungle guides, with their vast experience in jungle trekking, can share with the group.

Notwithstanding this, the explanation given in the email had in some ways enlightened us about Frim’s rationale for enforcing certain procedures, which I think are indeed reasonable.

Some of the facilities have also been vandalised, and Frim, as a semi-government agency, has to spend money to repair these facilities, while the entry fee collected is only RM1 per adult. This is also bearing in mind that Frim is first and foremost a research organisation, not a park per se.

Unfortunately, any member of the public who did not have the access to the senior staff might still just be staring at Frim’s website and start asking a lot of questions.

Nothing to hide

Frim could have chosen to be evasive, hoping that this whole episode would be forgotten after the dust has settled.

Had Frim been in a state of denial or chosen to retaliate, the consequences could have been worse.

Being a greenie, and I have to say I am always proud of Frim as one of best green lungs within the reach of urbanites, if Frim staff had acted like some of our politicians or senior civil servants when faced with a crisis, I may have reasons to dig into the Frim story.

The investigative journalistic instincts in me would want to go check out to see if Frim has indeed swung to the other extreme end of the pendulum or was there something that Frim staff had tried to hide.

I was happy when one of its senior staff members, Dr Woon Weng Chuen, suggested that all parties should meet. Together with the church’s representatives, Pastor Inky Ong and her two members, we finally met to discuss both sides of the story.

It appears to me that on one hand, Frim is happy to share their research campus with the public, but with one million visitors to cope with in one year, it is difficult for them to manage various groups of people.

At the same time, their security services are contracted out. Although Frim cannot absolve itself of the way its security guards behave, Dr Woon’s team assured us that Frim conducts briefing sessions frequently to educate their security guards from time to time.

As frontliners, security guards can make or break the reputation of an organisation, and unless they have are being trained on being polite, they can simply ruin any public relations efforts. Contracted or otherwise full-time employees, they represent the face of any organisation.

Bad experiences will be hard to unwind. Even when we entered Frim to meet Dr Woon and his team yesterday, we were told by the security guards that they did not know how to get in touch with Dr Woon.

For people who work in Frim, they can drive with their eyes closed but for outsiders, we had to drive into small lanes and reverse out in order to locate the meeting room. If not for a good meeting, this ‘bad’ experience could have made things worse for most people.

On June 13, a group of about 100 senior citizens and primary school children from Sri Damansara SIB church were on a morning outing at Frim.

It was supposed to be an easy-going morning walk organised by the church for its members, but when the group started growing in numbers from 8am through 10am, they were approached by security guards who told them to leave the premises.

Yesterday’s meeting went well, with both sides willing to open up and apologise to each other for the misunderstanding. Efforts will in fact be made to help Frim to better educate the public about protecting the beauty of Mother Nature.

“Despite facing all sorts of challenges dealing with the public, we are willing to share the rich biodiversities we have in Frim with fellow Malaysians,” concluded Dr Woon, to which Pastor Ong responded: “And, it is also our joint responsibility to keep the place clean and well-preserved for the future generation of Malaysians.”

In fact, on June 13, both senior citizens and the young children had intended to go picking up the litter around the Frim campus, something which Dr Woon’s team and I were informed of for the first time.

 

STEPHEN NG is an ordinary citizen with an avid interest in following political developments in the country since 2008.