Lim (center) speaking to reporters after the hearing. Also seen were (from left) Trabawan and Robert.
KUCHING: The Sarawak Housing Purchaser’s Claims Tribunal here has ordered two housing developers to rectify all the house defects affecting two complainants.
Two cases regarding poor workmanship on two houses were brought to the tribunal court at the Old DUN building today.
In the first case, complainant Harfiza Hipni found that she could not move into her new home despite receiving the Occupational Permit on Oct 25, 2018 and after the house was handed over to her on Nov 9, 2018, due to the numerous defects found in the single-storey intermediate terrace house at Bandar Baru Semariang.
The second case involved complainant Chong Jui Chin’s double-storey corner terrace house at Jalan Stephen Yong, which also had defects.
“For the first case, Harfiza, she has been asked to submit the full list of outstanding defects of her house to us. Our officers will make an inspection after the developer has completed the repairs.”
“For Chong’s case, there is no claim for late delivery, except that the defects will be rectified by the developer within 45 days of today’s hearing,” said Tribunal president Peter Lim at a press conference held after the hearing.
The list of defects brought to court by the complainants included a leaking ceiling, improper floor tiling, walls that were not properly plastered, doors that were unable to close and many more, he said.
He added that if the developers failed to comply with the directives, they can be fined not more than RM5,000 or jailed not more than two years under the Section 53(1) of the Housing Development (Control and Licensing ) Ordinance 2013.
They can also be fined RM1,000 per day for late compliance.
Meanwhile, the Tribunal Court has solved 46 cases in 2019 throughout the State, with 22 awarded compensation and 24 withdrawn.
Of that figure, 23 are Liquidated Ascertain Damages (LAD) cases, 14 Defect cases and nine LAD and Deceft/LAD and Specification cases.
There were 15 LAD cases with RM251,742.38 awarded.
Present were panelists Robert Elone Sireng and Trabawan Mandi.