RESIDENTS at the First Garden flats in Buntong, Ipoh, have been living in filth and danger for the past five years. 

Flats management committee chairman K. Juganther Nathan, 51, complained that the atrocious conditions at the flats posed a health and safety hazard to about 170 residents there. 

He claimed that there were no lights on the stairs and the corridors. 

“Our drains and sewers are clogged, rubbish is strewn everywhere, walls are either destroyed or vandalised and there are also many areas with stagnant water, attracting lots of mosquitoes and flies. 

“The place has also become a favourite haunt for drug addicts,” he told reporters before handing over a memorandum on the residents’ woes to Perak Mentri Besar Datuk Seri Mohamad Tajol Rosli Ghazali in Ipoh recently . 

The 280-unit flats were built in the 1980s and had previously been maintained by the Kinta Properties Group until July 2000. 

Committee secretary Ng Leong Meng, 51, said that the developer stopped maintaining the flats as they were running at a loss. 

The residents later formed a committee to maintain the place in 2000 but it dissolved as many of them refused to pay maintenance fees. 

Said Ng: “Since then, we have been having countless dialogues with the authorities. However, we were told that the land is still under private property and that the state government could not intervene. 

“We just want the state government to appoint an authority to conduct proper routine maintenance on the flats.” 

Special officer Mohamad Fariz Mohamad Hanip received the memorandum on behalf of Tajol Rosli. 

He told the residents that a meeting would be held at the flats between the residents and representatives of the city council and district land office on April 21 at 3pm. 

It was the third memorandum sent to the state government as the residents had not seen any response to the ones sent on Jan 14 and Feb 28.