Kuala Lumpur City Hall (DBKL) is not going ahead with a RM500 million construction project to build a four-tower office building for itself, deciding instead that the money would be used to create more affordable housing in KL.
KL Mayor Mohd Amin Nordin Abdul Aziz told StarMetro today the decision to cancel the proposed skyscraper was made by the Federal Government, which controls DBKL through the Ministry for the Federal Territories, citing the current difficult economic climate.
Now that the funds have been cleared up, DBKL is prioritising building more affordable housing for people living in the city instead.
“We are reviewing all our commitments for 2016. There are many projects planned for next year, and we decided that, based on the current economic situation, we really have to choose either to spend a lot of money on Menara DBKL 2 or to focus on affordable housing,” Mohd Amin said.
The skyscraper, tentatively dubbed DBKL2, would have been built over the existing Menara 2 of the City Hall complex in Jalan Raja Laut.
The construction of the new multi-tower building would have necessitated tearing down Menara 2, which had itself been recently renovated to the tune of several million ringgit.
Famed architects Hijjas Kasturi Associates was selected to design the new building.
This past March, we reported on the project, which was then valued at RM300 million, and the backlash it received from Federal Opposition politicians, in particular Teresa Kok, the DAP parliamentarian from Seputeh.
Kok had expressed her incredulity that so much money was to have been spent on an office block for use primarily by City Hall (and a few commercial tenants) while the city’s denizens were denied affordable housing:
Looks like she finally got her way. Let’s just hope those low-cost homes pop up soon.
