PERAK DEFIES PJ TO GO AHEAD WITH PLAN

IPOH: Perak will go ahead with its plan to issue freehold titles to the 149,000 house owners in 349 planned and 134 new villages despite objections from the Federal Government.

• “The state government has instructed land offices to proceed with the processing of the applications from (house owners in) planned and new villages,” Perak senior executive councillor Datuk Ngeh Koo Ham said.

• He was responding to a statement by Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak that the Perak government must first obtain the approval of the National Land Council before converting the leasehold to freehold titles.

• Ngeh had earlier attended the Perak Water Board meeting chaired by Mentri Besar Datuk Seri Mohammad Nizar Jamaluddin, who said the state need not wait for the council’s approval, but would submit a report to it. “The report would be merely for discussion,” Nizar added.

• Earlier, in a statement, Ngeh said: “The opinion of the (Deputy Prime Minister) that Perak cannot implement this until a decision is made by the council is at best misconceived.

• “In the absence of any legal impediment, the state government can lawfully proceed to implement the proposed conversion of leasehold title to a title in perpetuity.”

• From his reading of certain articles of the Federal Constitution and provisions of the National Land Code, Ngeh said, it was for the state authority, and not for the National Land Council, to decide whether the alienation of state land should be in perpetuity or leasehold.

• “The action of the Perak government does not contravene any statutory provision,” he said.

• Earlier Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak requested Perak to deferred the decision until the council has held an in-depth discussion on the matter.
  He said “We have a policy where states cannot make unilateral decision on issuing freehold land titles. Such titles are usually given to land that is to be used by the Federal Government, for public use and under special circumstances."
  

• “Until the council makes a decision, Perak cannot award the land titles to the people concerned,” he told reporters.
  However Perak cannot wait and proceed with issuing the titles to the house owners.

Source: