Fuziah Salleh blames Mahathir for LYNAS - we Malaysians in addition blame him also for A.R.E (see linked post)

Fuziah: Dr M didn't want to close Lynas during Harapan's administration


PARLIAMENT | Fuziah Salleh (Harapan-Kuantan) has trained her guns at former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad, accusing the nonagenarian of not wanting to close down rare earth processing plant Lynas Malaysia Sdn Bhd during Pakatan Harapan’s rule.

"People asked, why didn't we close down Lynas during Harapan's era? I want to tell them that it was Mahathir who did not want it to shut down.

"He is not in the Dewan Rakyat today. If he was here, he can answer why he declined to do so," Fuziah (above) said while debating the royal address in Parliament today.

"But Yeo Bee Yin, the then energy, science, technology, environment and climate change minister worked very hard to do something, she instructed Lynas to shift its cracking and leaching facility back to Australia," she added.

Fuziah said this when expressing her frustration over the government’s failure to resolve the Lynas issue since the firm set foot in Malaysia back in 2008.

"The government was deceived in 2008 and after several changes in administrations, we are still unable to resolve the Lynas issue.

“Is Lynas so strong? It is merely an Aussie firm that did not pay any tax to the government, why is the government defending Lynas?" she added.

In November 2019, then entrepreneur development minister Redzuan Yusof argued that closing down Lynas was never part of Harapan's election manifesto in 2018.

Fuziah questions govt’s PDF approval

Fuziah also slammed the government for granting approval for Lynas to construct a permanent disposal facility (PDF) in the Gebeng Industrial Estate without observing due process.

This is particularly so when the local authority was still carrying out research on the change of land use of the Gebeng Industrial Estate to accept Lynas' toxic and radioactive waste dump.

"In a written parliamentary reply, the housing and local government minister said the Pahang state planning committee had granted approval for the PDF site (to store) the water leach purification (WLP) residue.

"He said the planning permission was given with an amendment to the plan by the Kuantan City Council on Jan 12.

"How could this happen when the Kuantan City Council was carrying out a study to change the land use of the Gebeng Industrial Estate? The research was supposed to be conducted from Dec 12, 2021, until tomorrow (March 11)," she said.

Fuziah pointed out that the study was still in progress and will be published for the public's view but the housing and local government minister said the project had already been approved in January.

"What kind of answer is that? The minister should not get his share of wages.

"Today, we have one million metric tonne of radioactive waste in Gebeng. It is as though they (the government) don't know what to do with it, so they are 'okay' (to allow these toxic wastes to remain in Gebeng)," she said.

See also Lynas and A.R.E - Mahathir's evil legacies

The facility (Asian Rare Earth - A.R.E) was warmly embraced by Mahathir's old government (and cronies) as an advanced foreign investment that would help create jobs in Perak. But of course the old cunning musang did not have that plant situated in his own constituency of Kubang Pasu despite his public confidence it was safe.





Although the A.R.E operations have gone, alas, today its toxic legacy persists. Yes, the plant has been abandoned, but the locals saw a rise in leukaemia, birth defects, infant deaths, congenital diseases, miscarriages and lead poisoning in the following years since it ceased operations.

We couldn't do much about the Mahathir government's approval of Asia Rare Earth (A.R.E), but shouldn't their (Bukit Merah and Papan's) ill fate serve as a warning to Malaysia to stop the Lynas rare-earths plant in Pahang from continuing?




Papan residents strolling past a row of pre-war shop houses that are now mainly abandoned

In 1985, the residents of Bukit Merah obtained an injunction to stop A.R.E from operating until it met safety standards. But it wasn't until 1992 when A.R.E closed down the factory operations as a result of increasing public pressure that threatened to launch a global boycott on Mitsubishi products. Yes, it was Mitsubishi which closed the mine, not Mahathir.