KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 22 — Datuk Seri Nazri Aziz said he would meet Prasarana Negara Berhad to lobby for a realignment of the Klang Valley Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) route to avoid the need to acquire properties in Jalan Sultan and Jalan Petaling here.
The minister in the Prime Minister's Department had promised on Tuesday to meet the prime minister to push for a realignment of the multimillion ringgit rail network which, according to current plans, affects a part of Chinatown.
He said he would meet Prasarana chief executive officer Sharil Mokthar when he returns from abroad after September 27.
Although Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak had announced that the MRT project will be handed over to MRT Co from September 1, the senior Cabinet minister said it had not officially taken over from Prasarana yet.
“The best practice for underground engineering, first you must do it under a wide road, secondly, it shouldn’t have any sharp cornering, it has to be smooth.
“So they suggested a new alignment, alternative route, under Jalan Cheng Lock and goes until Jalan Tun Perak, Jalan Pudu. So the alignment, the cornering is very smooth and gentle,” he said, referring to the Jalan Sultan committee that has a few engineers contributing to the new proposed route.
He explained that there are no buildings on the surface of the suggested route, thus cutting land acquisition costs.
Nazri said if an agreement is reached during the meeting with Prasarana, then there will be no need to meet with the Prime Minister on the matter.
“I will ask Prasarana to consider the amendment to the plans.
“I support what their request because firstly, I love heritage buildings, I am interested in traditional buildings in our country that needs to be preserved,” he said adding that the current MRT route is not cast in stone yet.
The former Victoria Institution student said it is a logical and valid request and should be given a reasonable consideration.
Regulators Land Public Transport Commission (SPAD) and Prasarana have been under constant fire from angry traders with businesses located in the historic Chinatown area over its plan to acquire their properties to facilitate the tunnelling portion of the multibillion ringgit rail project.
Suspicion has also arisen over whether the transport regulator’s purpose of acquiring the prime land lots was to exploit their commercial value to fund the construction of the MRT, said to be Malaysia’s most expensive infrastructure project to date.
Among others, Jalan Sultan traders are also upset that they had not been consulted prior to the final alignment of the MRT’s Sungai Buloh-Kajang line and are now also mulling over whether to follow Bukit Bintang traders by taking their fight to court.
SPAD has since come out to deny any intention of a “land grab” in its acquisition of Jalan Sultan properties but admitted it could not guarantee that the acquired lots would later be returned to landowners.
In a letter to The Malaysian Insider recently, SPAD chief executive officer Mohd Nur Kamal said while the acquisition process was being worked out in detail, the government “is in no position to make guarantees of the return of these properties”.
But he reasoned that what was most important was that the government had “listened” to feedback from the affected parties and had agreed to a mutually acceptable outcome.
KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 20 — Datuk Seri Nazri Aziz today waded into the MRT land grab controversy plaguing Jalan Sultan and Jalan Bukit Bintang traders, by promising to meet with the prime minister tomorrow to push for a realignment of the multimillion ringgit rail network.