The Urgent Need To Recycle And A Push For A Clean Aesthetic Environment

We are constantly reminded that there is no more land available to fill our rubbish with. So very soon “we will be living next to a dumpsite” said our Minister of Housing and Local Government, Dato’ Seri Ong Ka Ting.
The Environment Commission will not let this happen if we had any sense of shame and love for our country. Therefore we are in the process of setting up a Recycling Centre in Section 14, Petaling Jaya, and if all goes well according to plan, the Centre should start functioning in early November.

The habit of separating the rubbish for recycling alone, I thought, is not enough, if we do not at the same time raise awareness educate the citizens to make an effort to keep their area a clean, rat, garbage and pollution free environment.

We have adopted Section 14, Petaling Jaya as our pilot project. If we succeed with your help we will go to other areas within Petaling Jaya. So two months ago Mr Siraj, CEO of Alam Flora, officers from MPPJ, the contractor, the Recycling Unit and myself took a walk one morning along the commercial centre in Taman Selara, at Section 14, Petaling Jaya and discovered that a lot of repair work and cleaning up needed to be done.

Action was taken immediately and now it is quite clean. However a lot more needs to be attended to. I am now in contact with the relevant person in MPPJ, in charge of maintenance work He and I will walk down that particular area one morning soon and identify the following problems to be rectified.

The uneven patches on the road where water is stagnant, broken pavements with holes in the ground where rats live and come out to eat food left on the pavement, the lamp posts with the cover missing where electric cables and flex exposed causing an ugly sight, the protruding spikes left behind on the pavement after the bill boards had been removed causing danger to pedestrians and the bushes where the plant cuttings are left behind causing an untidy ugly sight.

If we want changes to be made for the better, the community, the citizens have to push for it. We cannot expect the government to do everything. The community has to alert the authorities and bring the problems up to them. I urgently need the help of those living in Section 14, Petaling Jaya to assist me not only with the recycling programme but also to give me ideas suggestions and whatever other ways you can , like raising awareness in the community for the maintenance of a clean green and beautiful environment so that we can live in dignity and pride of place and that this was possible only because of the community’s effort.