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Can Selangor’s water woes end next year? MB says yes, but at a cost of tens of millions of ringgit

Selangor Mentri Besar Datuk Seri Amirudin Shari speaks during a press conference at the Selangor state secretariat building in Shah Alam October 21, 2020. — Picture by Yusof Mat Isa
Selangor Mentri Besar Datuk Seri Amirudin Shari speaks during a press conference at the Selangor state secretariat building in Shah Alam October 21, 2020. — Picture by Yusof Mat Isa

SHAH ALAM, Oct 21 — Selangor Mentri Besar Datuk Seri Amirudin Shari today indicated that the water woes plaguing the state may end by end 2021, but will require a hefty budget exceeding tens of millions of ringgit.

Speaking at a press conference today, Amirudin announced his state government’s plans to deal with the increasingly regular water disruptions, including the implementation of a system that can immediately block the passage of polluted water from the river entering the water treatment plants.

The system will then channel water from other sources to consumers, to avoid unscheduled water cuts.

“We have identified a few steps, and among the steps include the usage of certain technology to eliminate and deodorise odour at the water treatment plants, and secondly maybe directly channel water supply which is not polluted, while blocking water that is polluted.

“What happens now is that when the water flows directly until the intake of the water treatment plants, we would not have any other choice but to shut down the treatment plants. So this definitely would incur a relatively high cost, with the amount surely exceeding tens of millions of ringgit, if we can finalise decisions in the early stage, God willing, will table it in the state budget, as to what decision we want to take,” he added.

Amirudin said the long-term plan, estimated to take about a year, is to increase the quality of management and treatment of water in Selangor’s treatment plants.

He said Izham Hashim, the infrastructure, public utilities, modernisation of agriculture and agro-based the state executive councillor has been put in charge of handling the matter.

During the press conference, Amirudin also announced a RM20,000 reward to anyone who can provide “concrete and useful” information on water polluters to the state government.

Last Monday, Air Selangor issued a stop-work order on Phases 1, 2, 3 and Rantau Panjang water treatment plants after suspected contamination of Sungai Selangor, resulting in an unscheduled water cut that affected 1.2 million accounts in 1,292 areas in Kuala Lumpur, Petaling, Klang/Shah Alam, Kuala Selangor, Hulu Selangor, Gombak and Kuala Langat.

In today’s press conference, Amirudin said that water supply has since been restored to 90 per cent of the areas affected by the water supply disruption.

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