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KUCHING, Sept 8: Inadequate urban planning and the absence of a comprehensive development masterplan has been blamed for the shophouse fire at Jalan Mantis in Sibu today which could have been prevented from escalating into a disaster.
Dudong assemblyman Dato Sri Tiong King Sing said from the many videos circulating online, it appeared that the Fire and Rescue Department (Bomba) Sarawak firefighters were struggling with low water pressure from the hydrants as well as a shortage of essential equipment which exacerbated the situation.
“It took too long to put out (the fire) and (eventually) it went out of control.
“This was made worse without proper ladder equipment, forcing them to haphazardly use a ladder on the fire engine to climb to the third floor and use another shoplot to spray water across the alley onto the shoplot on fire,” he said in a statement shared on this social media today.
Tiong, who is also Federal Minister of Tourism, Arts and Culture, highlighted that this clearly showed that in a developing Sibu, the necessary utility infrastructure for water, electricity, signal coverage, road planning, and so on is done shoddily and without order.
He pointed out that the pursuit of economic growth and expansion should not come at the expense of safety and the well-being of the community.
He criticised the current practice by relevant authorities of hastily completing infrastructure projects without due diligence, emphasising, “They have been done just for the sake of doing, but this is playing with people’s lives. It is completely unacceptable for this to go on until a problem occurs before taking action. This way, only the people lose while the authorities get away scot-free.”
Tiong disclosed that he had frequently reported cases of low water pressure and unstable water supply in various parts of Sibu, including those affecting multi-storey buildings, to both the Sibu Water Board (SWB) and the Rural Water Supply Department (JBALB).
“Shops and businesses keep facing the same dilemma all the time but SWB and JBALB only give excuses and lip-service. They simply lack the will and urgency to solve the people’s problem at source,” he claimed.
In light of the latest incident, Tiong admonished that it is now abundantly clear that these departments have failed in their responsibilities.
“They must immediately begin to communicate with each other on how to improve and solve issues of the existing infrastructure,” he said.
Tiong also emphasised that developers in their initial plans must remember that it is necessary to periodically upgrade the infrastructure to meet evolving safer standards and the demands of a growing population.
“After this latest fire tragedy, the department cannot continue to shirk their duties. They need to do some self-reflection and attempt to correct past mistakes to prevent more emergencies like the one on Jalan Mantis,” he added. — DayakDaily
