KOTA KINABALU: The Environment Protection Department (EPD) has expressed surprise at the Auditor General’s Report 2012 that nine of the 14 quarry operators in Sabah had been violating the regulations as stipulated in the EIA Report approved by the department.
Its director Yabi Yangkat said the nine quarry operators haf complied fairly well with the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) terms and conditions.
He said all the quarry operators had reported back to the department showing evidence of compliance and mitigation measures performed at their project sites.
However, he said, two out of the nine quarry operators had been compounded for major non-compliance with the terms and conditions of the EIA approval.
Yabi said he was surprised to note that such report still came out even after the Sabah State Auditor Department director had accepted the explanation by his department during a conference held on November 27, 2012 at the Land and Surveys Department on the action taken by all the quarry operators to comply with the EIA terms and conditions.
With such explanation, the Sabah State Auditor Department director gave his positive remarks that the EPD had done a good job in protecting the environment from quarry operations, he said.
Yabi further explained that in the actual fact the Auditor General studied the management of quarry licenses in Sabah which came under the purview of the Land and Survey Department. The EIA terms and conditions enforced by EPD were likewise assessed as it is part of the license requirement for quarry operation.
The EIA terms and conditions vary from minor to major categories and it has been the department’s practice to warn the quarry operators to comply with the EIA terms and conditions at any level of non-compliance even it involves minor non-conformance such as a small burning patch at project site, he said.
He highlighted that the department is pursuing such approach to ensure that any environmental crisis or issues are tackled in advance before it gets serious.
The director reminds all quarry operators to fully comply with the EIA terms and conditions in order to avoid any environmental issues, otherwise legal action will be taken against them.
The Environment Protection Enactment 2002, which was amended in November 2012, provides a stringent provision whereby any defaulter can be compounded up to fifty thousand ringgit compared to previous a maximum compound which was only twenty thousand ringgit.
With this clarification, the director hopes that all quarters are informed on the action taken by EPD to ensure all the quarry operators are fully complying with the EIA terms and conditions and also understand the actual fact pertaining to the Auditor General’s Report 2012.