CF woes: City Hall confident of clearing backlog

The Star 27/09/2001 By Angela Rao

CITY HALL is confident it will be able to settle the problem of houses without Certificates of Fitness (CF) soon.

Some of the houses were built more than 10 years ago.

Datuk Bandar Tan Sri Kamaruzzaman Shariff said although a number of cases had been solved there were still developers who could not fulfill the requirements set by the local authority.

A committee has been set up in March to look into the CF problems.

''There are still developers who have yet to fulfill even the basic conditions imposed by City Hall but we are trying to clear the backlog.

He was unable to give details of the backlog.

There are many reasons why developers are often denied CF. The main reason is the development charge imposed on the project by local authorities.

A developer with financial problems sometimes does not apply for the CF but extends the Temporary CF (TCF) from year to year. There are those who have converted the land from various usage – agriculture, commercial or residential to residential or commercial but have not applied for it formally.

The matter would have to be settled by the Land Office but in some cases, the developer does not make any attempt to get it coverted.

And for shop houses especially, the CF is issued based on approval by the Fire and Rescue Depart-ment after they have certified that the premises is safe.

There are many cases which were highlighted by the media where CFs have yet to be issued for 10 years or more in areas such as Taman Shamelin Perkasa, Segambut and Bandar Baru Sentul.