Is Selangor Losing Its Way?

 

MB Amirudin Shari says Selangor needs a landslide victory to protect PM Anwar Ibrahim’s second term. 

But here is the reality: voters won't reward a government that ignores them. If "Little Napoleons" continue to frustrate the public, PH risks losing its base to apathy or the Opposition.

Despite three decades under PH, Selangor’s hygiene is an embarrassment. It even raised an irk with the Sultan of Selangor recently, but despite His Royal Highness' rebuke, illegal dumping continues despite calls for the council staff to stake out at nights to nab the illegal dumpsters. 

While the state chases expensive incinerator projects, developed nations are moving back to basics—recycling and waste separation.

The Penang Parallel

Selangor could have been another Penang. I remember when Komtar’s stench was enough to ruin a family stroll; today, Penang is a model of cleanliness. 

The difference? 

A commitment to reform and a willingness to tackle the "typical" failures of local councils—like the recent case in Seberang Perai where a persistent waste complaint was finally addressed through proper leadership.

If Selangor wants a "big win," it needs to start cleaning up—both its streets and its administration.

When I received a complaint from a friend about a float parked beside his house, it was not dismissed as a petty complaint by the state authority even though the local government ignored the complaint and did nothing about it.

The difference here is accountability. Both Penang and Selangor may have local councils that are underperforming, but in this case, a few ladies came to the rescue.

Once the issue reached the Chief Minister’s assistant, Jo Le Ye, it took less than a week to fix—no doubt helped by the fact that it sits within the CM’s own constituency. The complaint did not even have to reach the chief minister’s ears, but I believe by now Chow Kon Yeow would have been briefed.

I don’t know the exact role Seberang Prai local councillor Rachel Teh played in the process, but the outcome spoke for itself. 

My friend went from frustrated residents to grateful citizens. If Selangor's 'Little Napoleons' at the local councils want to see how to keep a mandate, they should look at this example of getting the basics right. In fact, they do not even have to go to Penang, just learn from the Petaling Jaya mayor, Datuk Zahri Samingon.

I remember before the Covid pandemic, I wanted to prove to the Selangor state government that it has to totally revamp its local councils making sure that they appoint the right people with a right attitude. 

Seven, or even eight years have passed, yet we are seeing the same problems. These days I have stopped wasting time trying to write to the MB.

It has come to the point that a petty matter like the issue of the security guards being denied chairs to sit during their 12-hour shift had to be escalated up the hierarchy before it reverts back to the council chief who immediately instruct his town planner to resolve the matter.

This isn’t the only incident where I proved that despite complaints raised for months — in fact, years — before the local council acted on the complaints. 

Take for example, the two humps at a housing estate which became a problem to residents. Three years ago when I asked the MP to get the council to fix as well when they finally fixed the first two humps, the problem remained a thorn in the flesh. Even complaints to the MP fell on deaf ears, and what’s worse is the state assemblyman is hardly known to be doing her job. It gives me an impression that, after the elections, some politicians have preferred to be all three proverbial monkeys:

It is not that the state does not know the problem, but they had become too oblivious to the people’s grievances, yet business carries on as usual unlike what I see being done to resolve a problem here in Batu Kawan.

If you want to see Selangor’s waste problem in its rawest form, look at the Rawang Integrated Industrial Park. The illegal dumping there is out of control, as evidenced by photos circulating in a local chat group. I have passed this evidence to a newly appointed local councillor, and the ball is now in her court.

I hope she pushes the council’s president, his enforcement director and public cleansing director to stop managing from behind a desk. 

We need midnight stakeouts and real consequences for those trashed our neighborhoods—the kind of grit we see from SWCorp and even the Petaling Jaya mayor himself who goes to the ground past midnight. 

The Final Word: A Test of Sincerity

The council can no longer simply hide behind KDEB every time a complaint is filed. We don’t need more excuses; we need clean streets and genuine accountability.

I will be watching closely to see if the council truly turns over a new leaf. At the suggestion of their own town planner, I have helped set up a task force and laid out the sheer mess they have made of the local traffic system. 

While I have provided several viable solutions (which need further refinements), the real test lies in their response. I want to see if they are sincere enough to develop even better strategies through discussions or just calling for meetings just to show they have had a dialogue with the complainant—without immediately treating the problem as just another opportunity to hunt for MARRIS funding.

There have been situations when I was extremely happy when a solution presented is far better than mine. A good example is Minister of Housing and Local Government’s transformation of public parks including ours! What we want is better infrastructure.