‘Kelantan needs all the help it can get’

PETALING JAYA: The Rantau Panjang district in Kelantan is experiencing its worst flood in history due to the unfinished flood mitigation works at Sungai Golok.

Kelantan Deputy Mentri Besar Datuk Dr Mohamed Fadzli Hassan said Thailand has completed the flood mitigation project on its side of the river, but as Malaysia has yet to complete even its first phase, floodwaters were spilling over and overflowing the riverbanks.

Rantau Panjang is situated on the border between Thailand and Malaysia.

“We plead to the Federal Government to please complete the three phases of the mitigation works as soon as possible, for we are talking of the lives and livelihood of thousands of families here,” he said.

Dr Mohamed Fadzli said hundreds of families have been forced to evacuate their homes in the past few days, adding that they had to be evacuated four more times from the temporary shelters as the shelters too got flooded.

“Kelantan needs all the help it can get from Putrajaya. We in the state government are doing everything we can, but most of all, we need Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim to fulfil his promise to complete the flood mitigation works that had started with previous governments.

“Unless the flood mitigation works are completed, this would be a never-ending problem every monsoon season. We need urgent action from Putrajaya,” he added.

Pasir Mas MP Ahmad Fadhli Shaari, whose parliamentary constituency is next to Rantau Panjang, said the area has been completely paralysed by the floods.

“The priority is to get hundreds of families to the shelters as the floods this time around are really bad. It is worse than in previous years,” he said.

Former environment minister Datuk Seri Tuan Ibrahim Tuan Man said the first phase mitigation works at Sungai Golok started in 2021 under his tenure and were supposed to have been completed by the third quarter of this year.

He added that the three phases could be done simultaneously to save time as each phase took about three years to complete.

Meanwhile, Machang MP Wan Ahmad Fayhsal Wan Ahmad Kamal said the focus now should be on providing for flood victims, who are in dire need of basic necessities.

“In Machang, it is also the issue of the maintenance of drains by the Irrigation and Drainage Department,” he said, adding that Kampung Temangan was the worst affected village there.

Terengganu Mentri Besar Datuk Seri Dr Ahmad Samsuri Mokhtar said the situation in the state had eased up a bit and now the people were dealing with the aftermath.

“The Terengganu condition is not as bad as in Kelantan. The floods in the state have already started to subside as of today.

“As of noon (yesterday), we had 2,503 families comprising 8,732 flood victims at 98 flood shelters in eight districts.

“Hulu Terengganu, Dungun and Kemaman are the worst affected areas in Terengganu, with the three districts having 2,846, 2,829 and 1,196 victims respectively.

“We are now managing the return of thousands of flood victims to their homes. They are currently at temporary flood shelters.

“We also need to assess the property damage, which is a big task,” he said.