SUNGAI PETANI: A five-year-old boy drowned in the swimming pool of a resort here on Monday while his mother was attending a job interview just doors away.
In the 3pm incident, the 19-year-old mother had gone to the resort for a job prospect and she left her young child near the interview room while she completed filing up the forms before proceeding to undergo the interview
Upon completion, she noticed that her child was missing.
She began to frantically search the compound for the boy together with the resort’s security personnel.
Minutes later, the hotel staff found her son floating in the pool.
The woman, who is from Kampung Bagan Asam in Tanjung Dawai, Bedong, was taken in by police for brief questioning before she was released.
Her child was found face down in the adult section of the pool.
The distance between the pool and the interview room was 30 metres.
Police could not locate any eyewitnesses to the incident while there were no CCTV cameras installed at the pool area.
The mother revealed that there was only a lapse of 30 minutes from the time she left her child alone to the completion of the interview.
A post mortem has revealed that the cause of death was drowning, said Kuala Muda district police chief ACP Adzli Abu Shah.
Malaysian Association of Hotels (MAH) Kedah chapter chairman Eugene Dass said that the incident was most unfortunate but it underlines the need for both the guardians and all public premises to ensure that their properties are often under close supervision to prevent children from slipping through.
