KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 27 — A group of Pengerang residents in Johor were granted leave today to review a controversial licence allowing the developer of the multibillion ringgit Pengerang Integrated Petroleum Complex (PIPC) to relocate the graves at a Chinese cemetery in their township for the project.
Tan Poh Yee, one of the lawyer’s representing the 11 ethnic Chinese families, said that High Court Justice Datuk Zaleha Yusof made the decision in chambers today and set case management for November 10, while an inter parte hearing to temporarily freeze the execution of the licence has been scheduled for December 2.
She told Malay Mail Online that the residents are challenging the power of the Johor government to issue such a licence to PIPC’s developer, and have claimed that there are procedural defects in the process.
“Besides that concern (procedural defects), the residents are also worried because the new area where the graves will be relocated to are predominantly made up of the Muslim community and that this might give rise to other issues,” Tan said when contacted.
In June, some 100 Pengerang residents walked nearly 500km to protest the relocation of Chinese graves to make way for the oil refinery project there, and passed a memorandum to the Parliament.
Rights groups had previously called for a referendum on the matter while attempts to debate the issue in the August House failed.
The total value of PIPC, which includes the RM60 billion Petronas Refinery and Petrochemicals Integrated Development (Rapid) project, is believed to involve RM170 billion worth of investments once it starts operations in 2016.
The mega project is expected to turn Pengerang into a boom town for global petroleum investors, rivalling neighbouring Singapore as Asia’s most vibrant petrochemical hub, and creating over 40,000 jobs for locals from construction to downstream activities
Apart from fear over reports that one of the investors in RAPID — KuoKuang Petrochemical — had to abandon its plan to house a petrochemical project in Taiwan following concerns that those living in close proximity to such developments would see their lifespans reduced, a number of the affected 3,129 villagers in Pengerang are also unhappy with the government’s compensation payment.
According to previous reports, licenced fishermen have been offered RM30,000 in compensation payments for the loss of their livelihood while unlicenced fishermen are being offered RM15,000. Smallholders with between one and two acres of land have been offered between RM65,000 and RM105,000.
The government has also offered villagers the option of subsidised alternative housing on a 6,000 square foot piece of land with a built-up area of between 750 and 1,600 square feet, some 15 to 20km from their villages.
