YOURSAY | ‘Current draft raises serious constitutional and social issues that cannot be ignored.’

COMMENT | Govt powers under URA terribly excessive

FellowMalaysian: While I agree with most of the provisions made, I strongly believe that the Urban Renewal Act (URA) is necessary and imperative if we are to see our urban lands improve their aesthetics, value, and worth.

Urban redevelopment is not a unique phenomenon happening only in Malaysia. Tokyo, Singapore, London, and Sao Paulo, just to name a few cities.

These cities have implemented and successfully transformed a huge swath of properties from decades of neglect and disservice into spritely spruced, modern, liveable, and well-maintained housing and business centres that we see today.

In other words, if we are to see our land gain worth, value and admiration, we have little choice but to see all these regeneration developments as a necessary and unavoidable transformation process.

This does not preclude the local authorities from protecting and representing the owners and tenants from being displaced obtrusively or without reasonable compensation.

Save our currency: We don’t want bullies on our property.

Also, we want property owners to be decision makers in the redevelopment.

As for employment, we don’t want more opportunities for foreigners. First, let’s look at training opportunities in construction for locals.

Let the local construction moguls have a local 100 percent workforce. Then bring in URA.

The next thing we want to see is the overhang in properties. We have been concentrating on one industry - construction- since 1980, and it has the most inflation.

We neglected human resources. Have we matched supply and demand in building materials? We hear about shortages, raised prices.

Why isn’t URA addressing the physical inputs? We definitely don’t want our lands to be mortgaged for capital by developers.

We have seen cheats. Has legislation addressed that? What about recreation in the new redevelopment? Who pays?

Let’s do a pilot study in different areas together with assurance of compensation to the owners. We want feedback from owners.

UB40: This bill is so dangerous, especially for the poor living in these old flats.

Who will defend them when the government takes over these properties to demolish and redevelop the area?

Will the owners be compensated with new units in that area or be relocated to another area far away from their original place where they stay?

This URA must be fair and just to the owners of these properties. Otherwise, this Act must be stopped.

IndigoGoat3056: We share the concerns raised regarding the proposed URA, particularly the excessive concentration of power in the hands of the housing and local government minister and the Federal Executive Committee (FEC).

While urban renewal is important, the current draft of the URA raises serious constitutional and social issues that cannot be ignored.

Constitutional concerns: The URA’s provisions allowing redevelopment with as little as 51–80 percent owner consent (Section 12) may effectively compel minority owners to surrender their property. This raises potential conflicts with Article 13 of the Federal Constitution, which guarantees protection of property rights and requires fair compensation.

Tenants, often low-income residents, are at risk of eviction without resettlement or adequate compensation, implicating Article 5 rights relating to livelihood and shelter. Furthermore, the lack of safeguards for minority owners and affected communities may result in unequal treatment, contrary to Article 8, which guarantees equality before the law and equal protection.

Social and practical concerns: The Act heavily empowers the minister and appointed committees, leaving considerable room for patronage, corruption, and political influence. Without an independent oversight body, approvals, compensation, and mediation risk being biased towards developers, leaving owners and tenants vulnerable.

Recommendations: To ensure constitutionally compliant, socially just urban renewal, we urge the government to:

- Establish an independent Urban Redevelopment Commission to oversee approvals, mediation, and compensation.

- Clarify consent thresholds and strengthen protections for minority owners.

- Guarantee resettlement and fair compensation for all affected residents, including tenants.

- Ensure transparency and accountability to prevent abuse and political interference.

Urban renewal must be a tool for inclusive progress, respecting constitutional rights, social justice, and the welfare of all residents - not a vehicle for unchecked ministerial power or developer profit.

Koel: There is no doubt that urban housing conditions, especially of low-cost housing, need urgent rectification.

Crumbling structures, poor materials and the use of flimsy, cheap fillers and so on can be found in many of these homes. It is dangerous to life. This needs attention.

But the answer to that is not to make laws and policies that will lead to absolute powers and decision-making being vested in the hands of a few, possibly unscrupulous people who need to reward their crony developers.

What happens when worse governments are out to plunder the public coffers and take over? Have we learned nothing from 1MDB?

Increasing the gross development value (GDV) should not be at the expense of the well-being of the people, Nga.

Take a good, critical look at the damage done by your developer friends, whose greed has led to a poorer quality of life in many parts of the Klang Valley.

Building near power lines, near gas lines, near airports and hangars, failing to address flight paths overhead, failing to address issues of flood mitigation, failing to protect homebuyers from air, water and noise pollution are all just a few of the incredible damages done by greedy developers.

To say nothing of the fact that these very same dilapidated homes that you are now seeking to “renew” are sterling examples of wondrous developers, past and present.

All these were done, presumably with the help of “sterling” town planners, the Environment Department, and goodness knows which other “gaji buta” (pay received for very little work done) agency.

So what guarantees do we have that these proposed “urban renewals” are actually going to make the lives of Malaysians any better? Or is that not the point at all?

Coward: An independent commissioner is definitely what is missing in the legislation. In theory, a good idea, but this is Malaysia.

We do not really have a commissioner who is independent and who is trusted by others.

The only living person that I know who is trusted by all is former MACC chief Latheefa Koya. The other missing issue is transparency.

We want to know that the affected residents get the best deal they can get, and this means getting proper competition between developers.

This also reduces the chances of hanky-panky happening. It will also demonstrate that the process is fair and help build confidence in the process.

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