By Hafiz Jasri
Dusty, sore and irritating. It is some words that can describes the conditions of Bestari Jaya’s situations the best right now. Where you can take a picture with London’s background. But instead of mist covering the image, dust will fill the background. It is the difficulties faced by numerous BJ road’s user including the villagers when a sand mining manufacture is located in that area.
Upon investigating this matter more in depth, another problem arise. Not do the sand mining affected the roads, it also becoming a threat toward the villagers when some of the villagers claim that the mining industries are making their houses crack due to the movement of the sand. These are the main issue when a mining industries are located near to the settlements.
It was not a problem when the mining process are still in the control of the authorities. It became worst when they cannot monitor the total number of permitted lorries to carry the sands out of the area everyday. Heavy trucks used the main road that were also used by the villagers located not to far from the mining area. Therefore, they both have issue with each other.
Roads that were once in a good conditions are now full with potholes. Why? It is because the uncontrollable number of heavy vehicles used the roads everyday that worsen the situations. When the villagers made a complaint towards the authorities, They will only covered the potholes back but the number of the heavy vehicles have not being decreased yet.
Situation were jeopardized when the roads are wet. When rains fall, the water will fill up the potholes. Therefore, the roads will look unbelievably even. Eventhough it does look so, road’s user are exposed to possible dangers such as having an accident that could take their life away.
According to the Selangor’s Environmental Control Officer; Mr. Rizala Azman, the mine that is located at BJ are being managed by Kumpulan Semesta Sdn. Bhd. (KSSB) that the operation are according to the guideline given by the environmental department of the Ministry of Energy, Technology, Science, Climate and Environment. The extracting process are following the schedule given that they can only do the extractions in day time From 8 am until 5 pm. Therefore, no night shift are allowed so that the river can refill back its resources.
But the huge demand of sands by the developer makes the transportation of the resources getting more and more demanding. There is no mine worker works to clean the lorry’s tires upon exiting the entrance. It makes the roads became muddy since all the mud that is attached to the tires will later dropped bit by bit to the asphalt. When in sunny days, the mud will dried and then they are being lifted to the air when vehicles use the roads. Therefore, the “winter” come.
According to the KSSB operation manager; Mr. Halim Zaki, they do provides lorry cleaning before exiting the entrance. But upon our visit, there is non located to the main exit to the roads. It was provided but at the entrance of the mine. The lorry need to pass through almost a kilometer of non-asphalt road to enter the main road. Therefore, the dirt that attached are being carried away.
The damaged roads that caused by the heavy vehicles used are not just caused by the sand mine’s lorry transportation, others heavy vehicles are using the roads as an alternatives to Tanjong Malim. According to Jabatan Pengangkutan Jalan (JPJ) public relation officer; Mr. Hasbullah Hassan, some of the drivers are evading the main roads to evade authorities monitoring. Some of them does not have the document needed by the JPJ such as license of driving and permit to carry the loads. They are obligated to be summoned not more than RM 2 000 ringgit and and jailed not more than 2 years (individual) and for their company RM 2 000 to RM 500 000 fined will be penalized. They will not take any risk to face the law.
That is only a part of the issue. The situation became worsen when the villagers claims that the mining of the sands by KSSB are causing their homes to be threatened by the landslides. They stated that the mining area are over its territory causing their homes to crack as the distance of their houses and the mine are only 200 meters away. Yeop Sanip, 62, Chairman of the villagers committee, stated that not only the villagers is at risk, student of Unisel were also at risk too. He afraid that the over extracting of the sand will caused the slight movement of land causing some part of BJ to sunk bit by bit into the earth. This effect can clearly be seen when some parts of Unisel’s building sunk into the earth.
Rizala Azman opposed the assumptions. According to the environment department, The sands extracted are the sands that flow through the river from the upper part of the river. It has nothing to do with the sediment that occurred. Landslides happened when the base of the land is not strong enough and not well compressed. Bestari Jaya was once a tin ore mines way back into the 60s. The lake were later fill with soil to be used as a cultivation and settlement area in early 90s. the land are still not compressed enough that make the area to sunk a little bit that caused the villager’s homes to crack. But the villagers still agreed that the mines have something to do with it.
Another problem that happened is when the extracting process makes the river murky. Bestari Jaya’s villagers are most farmers since its populations are surrounded by palm plantation. A small part of the villagers are depending on the river to make a living. This pollution caused the local fisherman; Sahril Malik, 30, to loose its sources of living. , Upon our visits there, the river does look murky. The river, after the extracting machine were located have turned into brownish colour that the fisherman stated it has caused the population of the fish declined. His source of living are being affected due to the polluted water.
If we are talking about village, a cool sensation of it are being imaginated in our mind. But not for the BJ’s villagers, they are living in a constant fear of landslides and road’s accident. Little did they wanted, if the government cannot stop the extracting of the sands at the mines, please control it. This will makes the numbers of the heavy vehicles and the risk of buried alive plummeted.
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