PUTRAJAYA, Dec 30 ― The Department of Environment (DoE) today denied a news portal report which claimed that the department had ignored a complaint lodged by a representative of Orang Asli over pollution at Sungai Menintei, Gua Musang.
DoE director-general Wan Abdul Latiff Wan Jaffar said the news report titled Orang Asli Kelantan Kesal JAS Abai Aduan Sungai Tercemar was untrue because investigations found that the complainant had not submitted any application for its officials to conduct water sample analysis as alleged.
"The article which was published on Dec 27 claimed that the application submitted by the Customary Land chairman of Kampung Kuala Wias and Kampung Wok, Jimi Angah was not attended to by DoE officials.
"However, the investigation revealed that the complainant actually met with the consultant of the Environmental Impact Assessment Report (EIA) on Dec 11 and not DoE officers," he said in a statement today.
According to him, a review of the EIA consultant's fieldwork form (on-site form) signed by the complainant also showed that there was no request from Jimi for DoE to conduct sampling analysis.
Meanwhile, Wan Abdul Latiff said DoE officers had conducted a water quality reading at Sungai Menintei yesterday where they found the water containing conductivity (59 μS/cm), salinity (0.03), dissolved oxygen (96.7 per cent) with a 7.7 pH, noting that based on the National Water Quality Standards, the water condition is clean. ― Bernama
