Penangites have nothing to fear as the enactment to corporatise the 130-year-old Botanic Gardens in the state provides legal measurements for it to be preserved and protected from damage due to development projects, according to state executive councillor Jagdeep Singh Deo.

He said the earlier enactment under the previous BN government in Penang did not provide for such measures.

Jagdeep pointed out that the legislation governing the gardens from 1923 to 2005, the Penang Waterfall Gardens Enactment, "failed to comprehensively" set out the parameters in terms of protecting, preserving, enhancing, upgrading and bettering the site.

"If we do not preserve the gardens, we will be breaching the current Act... That was not the position in the previous enactment," Jagdeep told reporters at a press conference in the gardens today...