GEORGE TOWN: Three cases of illegal dumping of waste were detected in the past 14 days raising concerns over indiscriminate discarding of waste here.
State executive councillor Phee Boon Poh shared photographs of the alleged incidents where one truck was seen discarding what is believed to be construction materials at a hill slope near an affordable housing construction site in Paya Terubong.
A second truck was doing the same but at another housing construction site in Tanjong Tokong.
Both incidents were a few hours apart on Saturday while about a week ago, CCTV footage at the Esplanade captured two suspects dumping several barrels of what is believed to be chemicals into the Penang Channel near the Farquhar Street.
Phee said that he had directed the construction site operators in the two locations and the Penang Island City Council (MBPP) to investigate the matter.
He said that there could be outsiders coming to the sites indiscreetly to dump waste when there are four locations throughout the island to dump materials such as toxins and construction waste.
“Based on the advice of our legal director, we can only seize the vehicle under Section 70A of the Street, Drainage and Building Act 1974. Therefore we may need help to track down these culprits.”
Phee said that the local authorities were looking into lodging another police report - the second after the one last week on suspected illegal dumping of waste into the Penang Channel.
Fellow executive councillor Jagdeep Singh Deo, who is in charge of local government, said that Penang will not tolerate illegal dumping and urged the police to act fast to nab the culprits.
There are designated zones at the Jelutong landfill to accommodate all forms of waste including the hazardous ones, but the polluters decided to take shortcuts.
Jagdeep called for more community involvement in tackling the illegal dumping of waste.
