The Kedah government has not appointed third parties to negotiate with landowners on the value of their property in connection with the development of the Kulim International Airport (KXP).

Announcing this today, Menteri Besar Mukhriz Mahathir said the involvement of third parties in the form of private valuers who were not certified by developers nor government-linked companies was extremely regrettable as they were hoping to capitalise on the opportunity by taking advantage of landowners.

"They issued notices and invited landowners to attend a briefing on the land acquisition by the government (for the KXP development) but in reality, they are not involved. They just want to become middlemen," Mukhriz told reporters this upon the conclusion of a ceremony at which land titles and temporary occupation licences were given out to long-term residents in Kubang Pasu yesterday.

He also expressed dissatisfaction over the fact that these third parties were claiming to have complete information about the proposed boundary for the airport development when in fact this matter was still being deliberated on by the government and not yet announced.

Mukhriz advised landowners to deal directly with the state government on the matter, to avoid being made use of by these third parties, adding that the value of relevant land plots would be in line with the valuation set by the Valuation and Property Services Department.

"When it (land acquisition) is undertaken for the benefit of the public, we don't want the cost to skyrocket because, in the end, this will make a failure of the project [...] so we will all lose out," he added.

- Bernama