Selangor's excos to declare assets

The newly-minted Selangor government today decided that all members of the state cabinet will be required to make public their assets declaration.

However, the 11-member executive council has imposed a number of conditions on the government’s unprecedented move.

Exco members have to submit their assets details to the mentri besar every six months but only “general information” of their declarations would be made public.

All spouses and children of executive councillors are also required to file their declarations, but children who are above 21 years old are exempted from doing so.

Mentri Besar Abdul Khalid Ibrahim told a press conference after the exco meeting today that government enforcement agencies will be provided copies of the assets declarations so that they could launch probe, if necessary.

“We’ll make public only the general information relating the value of their (share)holdings, not the details. But the government and ACA can look at the details of the holdings,” he said.

Ban on hillslope development

Meanwhile, Khalid also announced that the state government will no longer entertain any new proposals for development project on hillslopes.

However, all 121 hillside projects that has been approved by the previous state government can proceed but they will be closely monitored.

“We can’t withdraw these projects because the approval has been given. What we can do is to make sure the projects will do no harm or bring any lost to the state.” he said.

Also at the press conference, Local Government, Research and Development exco Ronnie Liu said the appointment of new local councillors to replace those who have resigned would take time and the state cabinet is currently in the process of nominating candidates.

“The nomination process will take one month, and we will send the list of names to ACA, the police and Bank Negara to make sure the nominees are clean and competent,” he said.

The executive council has also today set up a three-member secretariat comprising executive councillors Teresa Kok, Dr Xavier Jeyakumar and Liu to handle issues relating to non-Muslim places of worship.

According to Xavier, the secretariat has already received numerous complaints from temples representatives as well as trustees regarding problems involving land.

He said the secretariat will work with non-government organisations and religious bodies on the issue of building new temples and would bring the matter to the exco meeting for the final decision.

“We will study whether there is a need for them. If they are necessary, we will give approval (to build them),” he said.

Poverty still the key problem

Khalid also said the idea of giving free the first 20 cubic meters of water to the people of Selangor was to provide some relief to residents who are facing high cost of living.

However, he said this move will not solve the issue of poverty.

“We are going to have Welfare and Poverty Committee to look at the poverty problem. It’s not just about water and electricity, but poverty as whole. We are going to find the best ways to tackle this problem.”

He added that there was also the need to address the state’s utilisation of water because in a decade the problem will become more serious in view of the high growth in population.

Explaining his support for the previous government’s policy of ‘zero squatters’, Khalid said the new state government will approach the issue differently as its concept of ‘Housing for All’ is to ensure there would eventually be no squatters in Selangor.

However, he said the state government will need some time to implement this policy.

Regarding the RM9 monthly levy for foreign labourers - another controversial issue mooted by Khalid - the new mentri besar said the amount is low compared to the RM3,000 to RM4,000 paid by these workers to come to Malaysia.

Open tenders in Perak too

Meanwhile, in Perak , Mentri Besar Mohammad Nizar Jamaluddin, announced today that his Pakatan Rakyat government will follow the example of the new state government in Penang to have an open tender system for public projects.

He added that priority of such projects will go to contractors from the state.

Mohammad Nizar also said that his government will be issuing permanent land titles to all new villages in Perak.