Official data related to bauxite mining in Kuantan should be made publicly available, said United Nations University professor Jamal Hisham Hashim.

"Where is the data (on bauxite)? Release it. They (the authorities) are doing regular monitoring but the data policy is not open," he said at a forum on bauxite mining at Universiti Malaya in Kuala Lumpur today.

Without official data, he said the public has been conducting investigation at its own expense.

He disclosed that he had spent several thousand of his own money to investigate bauxite mining in Kuantan because the official data was not open to the public.

Fellow professor Maketab Mohamed agreed with him on making the data publicly available, saying that this is a public matter.

"Do not wait for your MPs to ask. This is a public matter, give it to the public, we have the right to know," he said.

Even though PKR's Kuantan MP Fuziah Salleh had received data on bauxite mining from the Health Ministry, Maketab pointed out that the data given was only the average and not the raw data.

The average data would not be able to present the whole picture properly, he said.

"No pollution in the rivers? That is a lie.

"That is only the average data; what we want is the raw data," he said.

Bauxite mining in Kuantan has drawn criticisms and protests from local residents and NGOs for polluting the area.

On Jan 13, Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak had ordered the Urban Wellbeing, Housing and Local Government Ministry to carry out cleaning works in areas affected by the bauxite mining from Jan 14 to Feb 14.