JOHOR Menteri Besar Osman Sapian said he went to Batam Island at the time the Pasir Gudang crisis broke because it was a pre-planned working visit to improve collaboration between Johor’s tourism industry investors and their Indonesian counterparts.

He said the trip with a Johor delegation was for three days but was cut short to less than a day due to the toxic waste pollution crisis in the state.

“Throughout the 24 hours I was in Batam, the disaster management committee was in contact with me every two hours to ensure smooth and orderly progress of the operations.

“Therefore, I hope this explanation can address the misunderstanding and confusion among the people,” he said in a statement, after a long silence to criticism of his being away while the state grappled with the crisis.

Among those who had panned the Johor leader was former prime minister Najib Razak, who said Osman should have stayed home to supervise the clean-up.

Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad also expressed surprise at the trip and said he did not know anything about it.

“He went. I don’t know about this,” he told reporters at an event in Putrajaya yesterday.

He said he had cancelled several meetings scheduled during the trip, but some could not be avoided.

He said the Batam trip was part of preparations for Visit Johor 2020 year.

Osman thanked the agencies and staff for their work in managing the public health crisis.

Earlier today Yeo Bee Yin said work to clean up 1.5km of Sg Kim Kim, which commenced Wednesday, was completed.

The energy, technology, science, climate change and environment minister said, however, that monitoring would continue to see if anything more needs to be done to ensure safety.

“The 1.5km stretch of Sg Kim Kim that was polluted has already been cleaned up, but today we want to see what ‘touch-ups’ we can do.

“Today can be said to be a day of monitoring. Only after that can we can look into what further action is needed,” she told reporters at the state disaster management committee’s operations room today.

A total of 111 schools in the area have been ordered to close in the crisis.

The education minister said in a statement the schools will remain closed until further notice.

Parents of the schoolchildren, however, want an assurance from Putrajaya that the area is safe before they will allow their children to return to school. – March 17, 2019.