Petra Jaya service centre refutes claim over sewerage compensation, says paid to previous homeowner

KUCHING (Jan 21): The Petra Jaya Parliamentary Service Centre has refuted a claim made by a 69-year-old homeowner about her being denied ‘wang ehsan’ (ex-gratia) to compensate her for a sewerage project incident.

Speaking on behalf of the centre, Irwan Zulkarnain Muhammad Hasbie, who political secretary to Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Fadillah Yusof, clarified that the reason why the compensation was given to the former homeowner, instead of the complainant, was because the payment was approved before the latter purchased the house in Petra Jaya.

“The data was collected at the time when the ex-gratia aid was approved by the federal government, and it was registered under the name of the original homeowner.

“In this regard, the ex-gratia payment was lawfully paid to the original owner because the approval and data collection took place before the complainant bought the house,” he said in a statement.

In submitting her grievance to Democratic Action Party (DAP) Sarawak chairman Chong Chieng Jen recently, the 69-year old complainant said her property, purchased in October 2022, was damaged during the Kuching central sewerage project works in Petra Jaya, but she was still waiting for her compensation three years later.

It is stated that a compensation of RM166,000 was paid out through a government agency in March 2023.

“Despite the fact that she was registered as the house owner with the Land Registry Office in December 2022, a few months before the payout, the compensation was still paid to the beneficiaries of the previously-registered owner, who passed away in 2022,” Chong, the Stampin MP, said via a statement dated Jan 17 this year.

Chong claimed that under such circumstances, the estate’s beneficiaries should have either returned the money to the authorities, or transferred it to the current owner.

“Yet, knowing that they no longer have any interest in the house and thus the compensation therefore, the beneficiaries of the estate of the previous house owner chose to keep the money.

“This is an act of fraud,” said Chong in the statement, adding that the woman had pursued all available avenues, including lodging a police report against the beneficiaries, seeking assistance from local elected representatives, and initiating civil action in court.

“After three years of running around and waiting, her effort did not come to fruition,” said Chong.

“She has paid thousands of ringgit to engage lawyers to sue and finally obtained an order against some of the beneficiaries, but such order remains a paper judgment as the beneficiaries are nowhere to be found and thus, she cannot execute the order.”

Chong also claimed that none of the beneficiaries had been arrested, despite a police report being filed in July 2024.

In the clarification, Irwan Zulkarnain said the Kampung Tunku village security and development committee (JKKK) – the body entrusted with collecting homeowners’ details – had visited each house affected by the sewerage incident to obtain the names and bank account details required by the Sarawak State Development Office (SDO) as part of the compensation procedure.

“For the record, the original homeowners in the affected area had already submitted claims for compensation from the contractor involved as early as 2018.

“In this case, the complainant purchased the house from the original owner, with the registration process completed on Dec 14, 2022.

“Meanwhile, the ‘wang ehsan’ allocation for affected homeowners was obtained from the federal government in October 2022, followed by the data collection process by the JKKK.

“It is understood that the complainant bought the house without knowledge of the aid, with the ownership transfer completed on Dec 14, 2022.

“By that time, all recipients’ data had already been submitted to the SDO for the issuance of cheques, which were distributed in January 2023.”

Irwan Zulkarnain added that officers from Petra Jaya Parliamentary Service Centre had met the complainant several times since 2023 to explain the actual situation, which the complainant acknowledged and understood.

“The service centre acted only as a facilitator in coordinating the allocation from the federal government, with the JKKK assisting in preparing the relevant documents to be submitted to the SDO for cheque issuance.

“Regarding the police report lodged by the complainant in 2024, all relevant parties including the service centre, the SDO and the JKKK had their statements recorded by the police last year, and it was found that there was no case to be pursued.”

On the background of the ‘wang ehsan’, Petra Jaya Parliamentary Service Centre said the distribution of the ex-gratia to 219 homeowners affected by a sewerage project in Petra Jaya was carried out based on the names of house owners recorded by the JKKK, after the allocation was approved in October 2022.

The ex-gratia was realised after Fadillah, the Petra Jaya MP, raised the issue to the federal government, and also brought the then-prime minister Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob to personally visit the affected houses in Kampung Tunku in October 2021.

“Following that visit, Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob approved the ‘wang ehsan’ allocation in the following year,” said Irwan Zulkarnain.