Media Comment
by Lim Kit Siang  

(Petaling Jaya, Wednesday): The Department of Environment (DOE) should post the hourly Air Pollution Index (API) updates to provide accurate and timely information on its website, which is currently completely blank of any API information at the moment.  In contrast, the Singapore National Environment Agency provides hourly air  pollution index reading  (PSI – Pollution Standards Index)  from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. (http://app.nea.gov.sg/psi/)

While the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi is to be commended for revoking the eight-year ban on the release of the API, the DOE owes Malaysians a fulsome apology if it had misled the people about the severity of the air pollution from the haze in the past few days.

DOE should make public the API for the past week to clarify whether it had been frank and truthful about the  API in the past few days.

As at noon today, the API was “hazardous”  in Port Klang, Kuala Selangor and Shah Alam and at the “very unhealthy” level  in Putrajaya and Petaling Jaya, as shown below:

API readings of zero to 50 indicate good air quality, 51 to 100 moderate, 101 to 200 unhealthy, 201 to 300 very unhealthy, 301 to 500 hazardous, and above 500 dangerous.

Until yesterday, the DOE had assured Malaysians that the API had only reached “unhealthy” and never “very unhealthy” level.

This seemed to be most improbable, as it would mean that the  three spots, namely Port Klang, Kuala Selangor and Shah Alam had shot  to the “hazardous” zone above 301 and to reach 410 without ever being in the  “very unhealthy” level of between 201 to 300.

(10/08/2005)