By Peter Sibon
KUCHING, Dec 23: Kuching City North Hall (DBKU) will plant fast-growing trees species to replace some 200 angsana trees that were posing hazards to motorists along Jalan Tun Datuk Patinggi Haji Abdul Rahman Yakub in Petrajaya here.
Assistant Minister of Islamic Affairs and DBKU Datuk Dr Abdul Rahman Junaidi said the fast-growing trees would be planted once works to clear all the old trees along the road is completed within the next few weeks.
“We have to chop down the old trees as there have been two fatal accidents that have been reported due to broken branches of those old trees which have fallen on the victims while (they were) driving along the road during stormy weather and heavy rain.
“And just this year alone, there were seven reported cases whereby the branches of these old trees snapped and caused serious accidents along the stretch,” Dr Abdul Rahman told reporters after participating in a tree-planting ceremony in conjunction with the state-level ‘Malaysia Greening Campaign To Plant 100mil Trees Programme’ held at Bukit Siol here today.
He added that the trees were more than 35-years-old and were considered too old to withstand adverse weather conditions.
“According to our (DBKU) Head of Landscape Section, the trees are old and the branches have become brittle, easy to break and fall on the road.
“So to ensure that we don’t risk our road users, DBKU decided to chop all those trees,” he said.
Dr Abdul Rahman said the replacement trees which will be planted along the road will be much shorter but would be beautiful.
On a related issue, Dr Abdul Rahman said DBKU will carry out a rebranding exercise in areas under its jurisdiction to beatify its landscape.
“What we are going to do is to beautify our landscape and make DBKU a more pleasant place to live,” he said.
Meanwhile, DBKU mayor Datu Junaidi Reduan said the landscaping work along Jalan Tun Datuk Patinggi Haji Abdul Rahman Yakub would be completed by July 2021.
“There will be three phases to restore the landscape which include chopping the old trees, removing the stumps, and putting extra earth mounds before we plant new trees there,” he said. — DayakDaily
