Uncompleted apartment units
KOTA KINABALU: Buyers of the 1,012 housing units in the Putatan Platinum Apartment project undertaken by SPNB (Sayarikat Perumahan Negara Bhd) in Putatan township are facing a long delay in the completion of the project, according to Kota Kinabalu Member of Parliament Hiew King Cheu.
He said the buyers felt being let down by the government for failing to get the apartments ready on time.
He said the buyers, who had been very patient waiting for the apartments to be completed, found out later that their wait was going to be prolonged due to the slow progress of the project.
Hiew said he was told that there had been a change of contractor recently and the project had stalled for some time.
“This has further worried them and the delay is now into the fifth month. It will take at least another year before they can finally move in. There is so much work there to be completed,” he said.
Hiew claimed that the SPNB housing projects in Sabah were facing serious problems, and many of these projects, mostly high-rise medium cost apartments, had stalled.
The Putatan one was progressing slowly, he said, adding that he wanted the SPNB to explain the problems affecting its projects.
“The recently approval made on the amendment to the Housing Development Act 1966 (Control and Licensing) will come handy and useful if it is extended for use in Sabah and Sarawak. Very unfortunately this particular amendment of the Act cannot be used here to protect the rights of the house buyers. Why the house buyers in Sabah are not protected by a direct law which allows them to have a chance to defend and to protect their investments? Why Sabah government did not want to amend the set of Sabah laws to protect our house buyers? Some people said there are enough laws to protect the house buyers in Sabah, do you agree with that?
This is another project under the SPNB that faced difficulties and Sabah DAP will continue to expose other SPNB projects similarly faced problem in delay or stop work. The many buyers have met problems in their monthly repayments of the loan they took from the bank, and the delays have put them in further financial difficulties. It is adviceable for the bank to stop releasing the end financing loan money to the developer until they see some progress. Some buyers said they will instruct the bank to stop payment if necessary.