KUCHING: Traders at Petanak Market are concerned about the goings-on at a small wooden shack behind their trading place by the Sarawak River.
LIVING QUARTERS OR VICE DEN?: Jebi points out to the wooden shack occupied by unknown persons for the last six months.
The hut was built six months ago and the occupants seemed to be living a quiet and secluded life as their activities went largely unnoticed by the general public.
When reporters visited the shack yesterday, it was empty but the things inside revealed that the occupants might be living quite comfortably.
The reporters saw a fishing rod, fishing net, a stack of clothes, a television set and even a well-fed kitten.
The market’s cleaning contractor Andrew Koh told the reporters yesterday that they did their cleaning work around 3pm to 5pm daily.
“It is usually around this time that we would see somebody returning to the shack. Sometimes we saw two to three women and sometimes one or two men,” he said.
He noticed that the women and men did not look poor at all as they wore decent clothes and they always carried take-away food.
Koh also noticed that the occupants would go off when night falls.
Whether they actually stay in the hut or are running some kinds of illegal activities is not known.
“Some of the hawkers I asked claimed to have seen a woman prostitute around Petanak area at night. They said they saw the same woman going to the hut in the morning,” he said.
When asked if vice activities were going on at the hut, Koh said he was not certain.
On the other hand, he mentioned that ever since the hut went up six months ago, things have been stolen from the market.
Not wanting to point fingers at anyone, the traders have not taken any action.
Still, they hoped that the relevant authority would look into the matter and assist whoever stays in the hut to find a proper home.
School leaver Jebi Chabuk, 18, who is a cleaner at the market, said the occupants of the hut never bothered anybody.
They were rarely seen, he said, and no one ever took anything from the hut which the cleaners dubbed ‘Rumah Baboon’.
“When there’s high tide, the occupants would take away all their belongings and then return when the tide is low,” he said.
Whatever the reason for the existence of the hut and the goings-on in it, the public is concerned partly for the safety of the occupants and partly because it is on city land making it an eyesore.
With the state aiming to become squatters-free by 2015, the hut needs to go.