Despite promising residents that a joint committee would first be formed to discuss the building of high-tension cable towers in the area, utility giant Tenaga Nasional Bhd (TNB) today forced their way into the Rawang New Village and began survey works.

NONESome 50 villagers comprising mostly  women and the elderly tried to form a human chain to stop the 200 TNB employees backed up by police personnel but failed. 

Rawang state assemblyperson Gan Pei Nee told Malaysiakini that during the 15-minute confrontation at 8am, several villagers were injured.

Unable to stop the TNB workers, the villagers then resorted to keeping an eye on them as they proceeded with the site survey.

Gan revealed that the residents had received a letter from TNB stating that the utility giant would start the survey works from today.

She said she then wrote to TNB asking them to postpone their work and to set up a meeting with the residents for tomorrow, May 7.

"We requested the postponement because we wanted them to survey an alternative route nearby the Rawang New Village and also brief the villagers."

Gan claimed that a TNB senior general manager had agreed to both requests.

"But late last night, TNB changed their mind and called me saying that they will proceed with the survey work today."

Ten buildings to go

Village head Goh Ah Kow said TNB originally planned a high tension cable route through the nearby Rawang Perdana industrial park and that route didn’t go through their New Village.

NONE"But TNB has now sold the land in the New Village to a private company making it an industrial park.

"They now insist on going through our village."

In a statement today, TNB said that they would continue with the construction of the high tension cable towers in the village.

Ten buildings are expected to be demolished but a Chinese vernacular primary school and a temple in the New Village will remain.

On March 19, TNB had agreed to form a joint committee with Rawang New Village residents in order to work out an amicable solution to the land dispute.

NONEThe decision to form the committee was arrived at during a meeting between 10 villagers and eight TNB representatives ,chaired by Selangor Menteri Besar Khalid Ibrahim.

The move came in the wake of threats by TNB to demolish buildings in the village on March 17 to make way for the construction of the cable towers.

The demolition was called off at the eleventh-hour as villagers mounted barricades and formed human shields to prevent the authorities from entering their land.

Federal Court decision

Following this, the federal government, which owns TNB, announced that the demolition exercise would be called off pending talks between the company and the villagers on March 19 which saw the promise of the joint committee.

NONEThe villagers say they have explained to TNB that they are not against the high power cable tower project but appealed to the utility company to use an alternative site offered by the Selangor government.

TNB’s plans to build the towers at the village will cut the hamlet into two.

The residents are also worried about potential health hazards from the power lines and have held a number of protests against the plan including taking TNB to court.

However, the Federal Court ruled in November last year that TNB could resume its construction work.