KUALA LUMPUR – The Malaysian head of a global non-governmental organisation (NGO) defending heritage sites has called on Kuala Lumpur City Hall (DBKL) to reconsider development approvals for Federal Hill and to cease all ongoing works there.
Tiong Kian Boon, president of the International Council on Monuments and Sites (Icomos) Malaysia, said the historic Carcosa Seri Negara bungalow which is situated in the area is also under threat due to current developments there.
He said at least three development projects are underway in the area, also known as Bukit Persekutuan, as reported by a local daily on May 10.
Tiong said the projects had caused damage to 74ha of land that is home to 234 species of flora and fauna, serving as a green lung for Kuala Lumpur.
He said he is also disappointed that advice and feedback by other NGOs such as the Malaysian Nature Society (MNS) on the matter has gone unheeded by city hall.
Built over a century ago, Carcosa served as the residence of the British high commissioner during the colonial period, and was subsequently turned into a hotel in the early 1980s.
“Currently the Carcosa Seri Negara is neglected and dilapidated, for reasons unknown to Icomos Malaysia members, and we suspect the general public as well,” Tiong said in a statement.
“Heritage buildings are our non-renewable resources, and our country has lost many heritage buildings in the past in the name of progress and development.”
He also said it would be “a sad day” for the country if Carcosa Seri Negara shared the same fate as other lost buildings, as it had been painstakingly restored to its former glory from a state of disrepair in the 1980s.
Federal Hill was named to commemorate the formation of the Malay Federation in 1948.
Conservationists have warned of overdevelopment in Federal Hill after the area, which is among the few sizeable green lungs left in the capital, was excluded from the Kuala Lumpur Structural Plan 2040 draft.
The MNS has also proposed that the area be formally gazetted and turned into a world-class conservation, recreational and heritage site, which would also contribute to the goals of the Kuala Lumpur Low-Carbon Society Blueprint for 2030.
The MNS insisted the conservation initiative would take Kuala Lumpur a “long way forward” at little cost.
The latest call from the Icomos Malaysia president comes after numerous urgent appeals to protect the area have fallen on deaf ears.
In April 2020, an 18-page letter signed by 12 environmental groups had been submitted to DBKL, raising concerns about, among other things, Federal Hill not being recognised as a “green area” but merely as a “residential area” in the Kuala Lumpur Structural Plan 2040 draft.
The letter also objected to the fact that neither its biodiversity nor historical significance were recognised.
Icomos, a network of experts, is responsible for the evaluation of all nominations of cultural properties made to Unesco’s World Heritage List, with the criteria laid down by the World Heritage Committee.
The organisation was named by the Unesco World Heritage Convention as one of the three formal advisory bodies to the World Heritage Committee in 1972. The other two were the International Union for Conservation of Nature and the International Centre for the Study of the Preservation and Restoration of Cultural Property. – The Vibes, May 15, 2022
