The Department of Environment (DoE) must be held solely responsible for the death of Pantai Esen following its approval of a defective environmental impact assessment (EIA).
The assessment did not consider the full impact of cutting off open-sea currents and waves from smashing onto the beach and keeping it clean.
Nature’s beach-cleaning process has been totally shut down following the DoE’s approval of this defective assessment.
How could experts in the DoE not have seen the devastating effects of blocking sea currents entirely? The DoE must act to restore the sea currents and allow the waves to reach the shore. No other ‘mitigation’ measures can restore the beach to its pre-reclamation state.
If ‘life’ cannot be given back to the beach by allowing the full strength of waves to hit the shores, then the government, if it is truly serious about preventing damage, has only one remedy: undoing all the reclamation already done.
The DoE should answer a simple question that requires no advanced scientific knowledge: is it normal that during high tides no waves are hitting the shore and sending seawater several metres up the sandy, sloping beach?
Pantai Esen in southeastern Penang was once a lovely, lively beach that had existed for centuries. Since my school days in the 1950s, I had enjoyed this beach regularly. It was relatively unknown to people from other parts of Penang Island.
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But during the “movement control order”, when people could not visit crowded places like shopping malls, news about the beach spread quickly. Soon, hordes of picnickers flocked to it.
The beach still draws crowds, but now visitors cannot even dip their feet in the water or dig for siput (shellfish) on the sandy beach. Children are unable to play in the water or make sandcastles with wet sand.
To put it mildly, the beach is dead. Thick layers of black, smelly mud now cover its entire length.
There is so much hoo-ha about the causes of this thick, smelly mud layer.
The environment minister says his ministry is awaiting a report from the Chemistry Department to determine the cause of the pollution.
But this is no ordinary pollution, like illegal industrial waste dumping. At best, the Chemistry Department can only describe the composition of the mud. Can it explain why this material has settled on this particular beach and not elsewhere?
Zairil Khir Johari, the Penang executive councillor for infrastructure, claims there is no evidence linking the pollution at this beach to reclamation work for the artificial Silicon Island.
He points to surrounding agricultural activities and a sewage treatment plant, noting that survey results found no algae stuck or growing in the silt curtain area. This, he said, indicates that “the source is not from the Silicon Island reclamation project site”.
Does he mean that sewage is being dumped into the sea?
S Sundarajoo, the Penang housing and environment executive councillor, said the siltation might have occurred because waves could not reach the shoreline due to the reclamation work. He suggested the developer could build a canal or create a path so that waves could reach the beach.
The critical question is not whether the black, smelly mud is from the construction site, but whether it is because of the project.
I unequivocally support Sundarajoo’s observation that the thick deposits of black, smelly mud result from waves not reaching the shoreline. He is absolutely correct.
Waves and sea currents are nature’s beach-cleaning mechanism. The complete cutting off of waves and currents from reaching the shore is the sole cause of Pantai Esen’s death. No ‘mitigation measure’ will work to clean up the beach and restore it to its pre-reclamation days.
The environment minister must come clean about the effects of cutting off sea currents and waves, rather than seeking alternative explanations or scapegoats.
- Tegakkan maruah serta kualiti kehidupan rakyat
- Galakkan pembangunan saksama, lestari serta tangani krisis alam sekitar
- Raikan kerencaman dan keterangkuman
- Selamatkan demokrasi dan angkatkan keluhuran undang-undang
- Lawan rasuah dan kronisme
It is quite logical that if you block water currents to a place, the water there becomes stagnant. How about seeing the beaches in teluk gumbar? They still seem fine. If the entire southern stretch was left for reclamation as was earlier planned, all the beaches of South Penang would have become like esen
Pantai Esen BEFORE the waves were totally cut off by the reclamation works from reaching the shore and ‘washing’ the beach clean. The Department of Environment approved the destruction of this beach based on FALSE assurances in the EIA that the beach would not be adversely affected by the reclamation. https://www.facebook.com/ExpansionTeamChannel/videos/549606646770968/?mibextid=rS40aB7S9Ucbxw6v
There is an answer to why that happened, the sad thing is the authorities know the answers and know how to solve the problems but pretend to be stupid. One of the main reason is farming, lots of pig farms operating for years, maximising their profits not bother the environmental issues.
Pig farming on Penang Island was supposed to have been stopped some years back. Are any still operating anywhere?