The highly controversial eviction of Kampung Buah Pala villagers started today as developer Nusmetro Venture (P) Sdn Bhd moved in to tear down houses of owners who had agreed to relocate.
The demolition job started with a house whose owner had accepted compensation in the form of an alternate house and a relocation cost. The owner voluntarily handed over his house keys to the developer.
Under the watchful eye of the police and the residents association committee, the demolition team moved in to tear down this house. Some hours later, a second house was also torn down.
Police meanwhile arrested nearly 18 people, including lfour women, when villagers and MIC youth members resisted the team from demolishing other houses.
Those detained include village lawyer Darshan Singh Khaira and former PKR's Petaling Jaya municipal councillor A Thiruvenggadam.
Some protesters sustained injuries in the melee as the light strike force unit and other police personnel assaulted and pushed the human barricade into the village.
MIC youth member S Ragubalan, 28 and K Somasundram, 34, both claimed that they sustained injuries on the hands and bodies.
"A member of the demolition team hit me with a sledgehammer," said Ragubalan. Somasundram claimed he was hit by a policeman.
Social activist R Aravindraj said his camera lens was broken during the commotion.
Tempers also flared when a policeman known only as 'Azman' shouted "anak haram" to the crowd. The policeman quickly fled the scene when the angry crowd attempted to attack him.
However, commotion abruptly stopped after the village association assistant secretary C Tharmaraj (photo below) talked to the residents and other protesters to calm down.
All the arrested persons were lated whisked away in a police truck to nearby police station.
Division among villagers
Kampung Buah Pala Residents Association chairperson M Sugumaran said the first house to be demolished belonged to S Saravanan who accepted the compensation offered by the developer.
"Saravanan had never been part of the majority group. His action would not dampen the spirit of the villagers.
"The rest of us will stand united," he told journalists at the site, while the demolition team armed with sledgehammers destroyed the house.
The villagers had earlier refused to allow the demolition to take place, arguing that the court order was only for vacant possession but not for demolition of village homes.
They, however, allowed the demolition to proceed after the developer's director Gary Ho explained that Saravanan had already agreed to the compensation offer and handed over the house keys to the developer.
Although Nusmetro's demolition team wanted to tear down two more houses, the idea was abandoned following intense negotiations among the village leaders, the developer's representatives - Thomas Chan and Ho - and court officials.
Following negotiations, one of the affected houseowners K Shanmugam, 60, said the developer had agreed to his request to demolish his home by himself. The developer also dropped the idea of demolishing another neighbouring house belonging to Muniammah.
But a third house was torn down before a heavy downpour put a temporary stop to the demolition exercise.
The demolition work finally ended at 2pm with three vacant houses and part of a fourth house being torn down.
About 24 houseowners in the village have accepted the double-storey offer made by Nusmetro.
Angry with the state government
Last night, Sugumaran held state government responsible for the imminent destruction of their village.
He said Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng had in many meetings and media conferences repeatedly stated the state government would not give consent to the developer to demolish the village.
"If the state government had not given the consent to the developer to demolish the village, how can the demolition team now come to tear down our houses?
"Is this just another lie by the state government?" he asked, at a late night press conference at the village yesterday.
Sugumaran blasted Lim for 'washing his hands off the issue', slamming the Malacca-born Chief Minister of being responsible for the villagers' predicament.
Sugumaran said although 24 house owners have signed the offer letters, 20 were united not to let the village to be demolished without the state government undertaking constructive measures to end their predicament.
He said the villagers who signed up were offered RM8,000 ex-gratia compensation by Deputy Chief Minister 2 P Ramasamy to move out from the village.
'We could end up on the streets'
He said the villagers were told to vacate their houses first and only then the state government would hold negotiations to provide them with alternate houses for free.
"Can we rely on such a deal? We should be offered constructive deals before we can move out from our own land. We have seen so many projects in the past that have ended up abandoned.
"We could end up on the streets with nothing," said Sugumaran, adding the villagers would put up stiff resistance to stop the demolition team.
Nusmetro, accompanied by a large police squad, has twice failed to evict and demolish the houses last month.
Sugumaran said Lim had managed to manipulate the media and turned the public against the villagers by telling a different story to newsmen, especially the Chinese newspapers.
Sugumaran said Lim lied to the Penang people about the offers made to the villagers such as RM500,000 and RM350,000 when no such offers were ever tabled to us.
"We have been asking only for village homes and part of the land from beginning. But Lim is portraying us as greedy people making unreasonable demands.
"This is a blatant lie," said Sugumaran, calling on all 82 Pakatan Rakyat parliamentarians to declare their stand on the crisis.
"Where are the Pakatan MPs, especially Anwar Ibrahim who promised to save this village before the election? Before the election, Pakatan leaders knew where was Kampung Buah Pala.
"But now they don't visit us anymore," said Sugumaran
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