Will you believe it if I tell you that a housing area that has 500 over houses still does not have a playground or a community field? Is it not amazing that that local authorities or the relevant Government body can give cf to the developer without ensuring that the field is also completed?
This is exactly the malady of the residents of BU4, Bandar Utama, Petaling Jaya. They have raised this issue since 1998 and nobody seems to have moved to ensure that the field is build. The developers obviously felt that the children of BU4 do not matter. Probably building a playground is a waste of “valuable land” for the developers.
The MBPJ clearly had told the developers that the field MUST be build and handed over to MBPJ BEFORE they started development of more houses and condominiums on an adjacent land. The development on the adjacent land has gone full steam but the field is still incomplete…after more than 12 years!!!
Letters, petitions and pleas from the residents of BU4 failed.One resident, Shahkander Singh has taken this quest as a personal crusade for years.
This is a lesson to ordinary middle income citizens of this country that when it comes to matters of their life – they have to take it into their own hands. Hence, on 8th August 2010, the residents and the children of BU4 made their pleas public at a press conference next to the field that should have been theirs long ago.
I had invited YB Elizabeth Wong, the Adun of Bukit Lanjan to attend the press conference. She was in full support of the quest for the field. She suggested that MBPJ should issue a stop work order on the development of the adjacent development until the field is completed according to the specifications of the layout. Puan Zuraidah, the pengarah of Landscape MBPJ also attended the press conference. The President of BURA, Datuk Manpal Singh was also kind to attend and lend support to the BU4 residents.
The residents spoke. While mighty developer's may think only of profits, the residents want to send across this message - our families matter too!
Resulting from the press conference, it is anticipated that several meetings between BU4 residents and MBPJ will take place. Bottomline – the BU4 children and senior citizens hope that they will get their rightful field and playground by this year. Not another 15 year wait!
Middle class children do matter too!!!
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