YOURSAY | DBKL’s ‘nine-time repair’ of pothole an astonishing defence

YOURSAY | ‘They should know that there must be more serious underlying issue after the second repair.’

Pothole death: DBKL says it repaired Jalan Tengah nine times

IndigoKite6964: Kuala Lumpur City Hall (DBKL), if you are trying to solve a problem and you still fail after two attempts, don't expect to succeed trying to solve the problem using the same method the third time.

The Public Works Department (JKR) tried nine times and failed, probably with the same incompetent contractor doing the same thing. Only now they want to appoint a consultant. How about a more competent qualified engineer to head the road maintenance department? How about appointing a contractor with merits?

If the photo is anything to go by, the road had just a new surface put on. The earlier surface is still there. How can that be mechanically sound? The last repair was on Dec 26, hardly a month, and the pothole is back to take an innocent life.

Clearly, incompetence and/or corruption is at play here. Just condolences? Where is the apology?

I believe DBKL has just confessed to their incompetency that caused the death. This is akin to killing someone in an accident because of one's reckless driving. It is manslaughter and you can go to jail for it.

JKR is clearly reckless in this incident. So, why aren't they legally liable?

Docsarna: Exactly. I've seen beautiful roads being destroyed by contactors who came to dig for piping or underground cabling works. They left a completely messed-up road, which after a few months cracks up and then the cycle of pothole appearing, repair, etc, starts.

We don’t need an outside expert to resolve this. JKR has enough engineers who can just go and check the finished work before any payment is made to the contractors.

Well at least, this is how it should be, but then again… cash is king.

Pokokelapa: This is obviously a shoddy job. Once a pothole appears, it bounds to happen again. This is because the initial roadwork was badly done. Then it is just patched up without any technical know-how by unskilled workers.

The base foundation will again be disrupted after some time or even immediately after a heavy vehicle goes over it. The proper way is how they patch up highways, which involves cost and proper equipment.

Anyway, our ‘tidak apa’ officers will never change. There is never an ounce of passion in their work. It all reflects on the top ‘makan gaji’ seat warmers.

New Year: The road in front of my house had been resurfaced but the quality of the resurfacing is questionable.

So, whether you resurface it for any number of times, it is not going to solve the problem. It is the quality of work. So, stop this justification of completing the resurface, knowing fully well that the moment the road is reopened to traffic, all sort of vehicles will use it even as the road resurfacing has not settled yet.

Secondly, it is the quality of work. They don't surface it by studying the real work it needs but rather they just do patch-up work.

So please, these potholes are going to continue as the third problem is rain that will soften the patchwork and recreate the hole.

This is the attitude of our civil service. Just do the work without taking into consideration the quality of work. It is time to change their attitude and the way the work is done. If not, more lives will be lost.

Safefail: Many are talking about corruption. But even if there is no corruption involved, we could see how the public fund had been grossly and blatantly wasted.

Shoddy public-funded works/projects are common. I am pretty sure there are many more similar nine-time cases around. Add further to this is the huge recurring hidden wastages on the bloated public service that don't add value.

I won't be surprised if DBKL were to boast they had had nine road engineers assigned to supervise the tragic pothole and therefore had done their best possible.

The Truth Is Out There: It is always a little too late to take action when the damage had been done.

In this case, it takes another death for them to seriously look at the issue now. They said the road was repaired nine times over the past three months. Doesn't that tell us something's really wrong with that stretch of road?

There is a lack of responsibility and accountability with many local authorities. They're generally very reactive to any given situation. Always 'fighting fire' and never trying to prevent it in the first place.

MyMalaysia: Indeed. It’s total negligence. Nine times since September 2020 means something is really wrong. Are you sure paid contractors did actual work in those nine occasions?

You know this only because of a death and now you’re addressing it. If there’s no death, you are probably going to repair it 10, 11, 12 times.

There are some stupid people working at DBKL. Someone needs to be fired, otherwise justice will not be served.

JayWai: This is the kind of mentality of the folks who are put in charge. Since September 2020, they've fixed it nine times.

That's nine times in about 120 days or a repair needed every two weeks. This is clearly a fool who thinks he can do the same thing over and over again and hope the result will be different the next time.

If it were a problem with their house (a roof leak, for example), and they had to pay for the repairs out of their own pockets and had to live with the recurring problem, do you think they wouldn't have taken more effective steps to fix that problem?

The engineering department in charge of the maintenance of roads surely needs to be sacked. When they treat it as government’s money and not theirs, this will be the result.

They should know that there must be a more serious underlying issue in that pothole and gotten to the bottom of it after the second repair. 

They are responsible for causing the death of that elderly man. Period.

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