GEORGE TOWN: The Penang Island City Council has given its assurances that residential areas in Tanjung Bungah, where a landslide and sinkhole caused the collapse of part of a newly-built set of luxury homes on Sunday, are safe for occupancy.
Its engineering department head, Addnan Mohd Razali said checks carried out by consultants at surrounding buildings found they were safe.
He said the city council had ordered the project developer to ask its consultants to identify the cause of the landslide and sinkhole.
“We have also asked the developer to stop any work and mitigate the problem. From our checks, the surrounding areas are safe,” he said when asked on safety concerns raised by nearby residents following the incident.
On Sunday, three newly-built luxury houses on the hillside of Tanjung Bungah were destroyed after heavy downpour triggered a landslide and sink-hole, causing the whole double-lane road in front of the premises to collapse.
In the 2.30am incident, the centre of the retaining wall in front of the row of houses started to collapsed before the whole road caved in.
The units were going for between RM1.6 million and RM2.3 million each.
Elaborating, Addnan said the site where the incident occurred was a new area, which had yet to be opened to the public.
“It is still under the developer and no occupancy certificate (OC) has been issued for the project yet,” he added.
Meanwhile, Penang Hill Watch coordinator Rexy Prakash Chacko told the New Straits Times that in light of the recent landslide and formation of a sink-hole which occurred in Tanjung Bungah, above Chee Seng Gardens, the Penang government has to put a halt to all hill development activity across the state.
“It should also take the opportunity to reassess these projects to ensure safety. The state should also be firm in refraining from approving new developments on hillslopes in the future,” he said.
He said, in light of the recent happenings too, the state budget has to have a larger allocation for climate change studies as well as securing hillslopes and its scope should not just emphasise the effects of illegal farming, but also the effects of residential development on the hills.
Residents staying near the project in question had told the NST recently that a similar incident had occurred years ago at an area nearby.
They had claimed that a road project located about 200m from the affected area had to be closed due to the incident years ago.