For a number of days already, many parts of Malaysia had been shrouded in thick haze with an EPI reading of more than 140-150 in some places like Klang Valley. It's a laugh to hear the Malaysian Authorities warning everyone to stop open burning like burning the dead leaves in your garden and the rubbish that you've piled up, while forest fires in Sumatra are sending all the smoke and pollutants this way. Even some factory chimneys in and around the country are spouting up black smoke without being booked for polluting the air.
Some heavy trucks doing earth- and machinery-moving work for the government or some vehicles belonging to the government authorities themselves are doing the same. Even some public transport vehicles like buses and taxis, can be seen to spout black pollutants without being pulled off the street.
Ya, we can't blame the government for the air, water and , environmental pollution in the country. If the haze is caused by a foreign country, the water and many other forms of environmental pollution are caused by developers and pollution-insensitive people.Even with todays high standard of education, we still see people throwing off plastic and paper bags, wrappers, bottles and cigarette butts from their cars to the clean road. In some places, especially in and near the city area, the roads themselves are littered with all sorts of tissue papers and junk food wrappers. Worse still, the roads in some areas, though metaled are not level and full of potholes. Contractors responsible for laying water-hose and electric cables are seen to be covering the holes they have dug, themselves, without anyone from the authorities checking on the standard of work done.
That's the main problem today. Who checks on the standard of work done by the private contractors and ensure that the required standard had been achieved? That goes for building construction, road work and repairs, bridges, maintenance job, clean up work and everything? No point in having standards for everything developed if no one regularly checks on the the standards of work achieved in reality.Do the authorities have certain standards fixed for everything, to be followed by contractors or do contractors set their own standard? Even traffic control enforced by road workers when certain busy roads are under repair, seemed to be left to the worker on site who might not even know how to drive a car let alone control the flow of heave traffic. You don't expect to see traffic policemen when there's a jam up. They are busy hauling up speedsters on straight and uncrowded roads, sometimes stopping them at the narrowest point along the busy road.
So, is the haze bad? Maybe not for it can cover up a lot of inadequacies and oversights in our law enforcement quarter.
2 comments:
Akhi Norzah,
Forest fires in Sumatra apparently are annual occurrences.It has a lot to do with planting or replanting it seems. It would be of a week's duration and things are back to normal after that. As you've rightly pointed out our little rubbish burnings are just irritants and of no major consequence. Govt reactions seem active for a few days and tapered off when the situation improves. To me it's a personal response of donning masks or staying indoors, though life still goes on for the majority otherwise!
Hank
P/S Thanks for visiting. You can check it out anytime as I make regular postings (almost every other day)
Hey Akhi, your haikus are really soaring up high. In this hazy weather i find a lot of solace in following poetic adventure. I don;t really care about the haze now. My only worry is about the haze in our political climate. So many charges and counter charges about the integrity of the leaders in both camps that I don't know what to believe in anymore. It's fortunate that the economy is holding. If we run into hazy or bad weather there, we're in trouble. Wearing a mask in this bad political weather is not going to help. But life as you said goes on.
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