Do Malaysian love their rivers?

One of the most pitiful sight in Malaysia today is how dirty our rivers are. The big rivers like Sungei Pahang (Pahang River), Sungei Perak (Perak River) and Sungei Kelantan (Kelantan River) are silting and those in Sarawak are very muddy, probably silting and probably the upper reaches have been dirtied by development. It will not be long before even these rivers in Sarawak are silted as well. In those days the Pahang River could be navigated by big boats up to probably as far as Kuala Tahan, quite a distant inland (about 80 km). The late Sultan of Pahang then used to visit the riverine villages by his houseboat which really was a ship sized engineless boat towed by a diesel driven big boat.. And as for Perak River up to Kuala Kangsar (about 50 km) and Kelantan River probably as far as Kuala Krai (about 40 km), which are also quite far inland. But today the Pahang River can hardly be navigated by outboard motors what more big boats. And the Perak River is silting badly and is very shallow. And the Kelantan River have outboard motors plying probably at its source but go further up inland you can hardly maneuver such boats. Except of course during the rainy seasons when the rivers are flooded. But then during the flood seasons it is dangerous to maneuver boats in these rivers; you may hit a floating log or the river may have very strong currents. I would forecast that in years to come Sarawak River may not even be able to be maneuvered by big ships like what is being done today. I know that in Bintulu, Sarawak for example the Kemena River (another river in Sarawak but not connected to Sarawak River, but as dirty as the Sarawak River), big ships can go quite far inland. I have been there and I have seen big ships as far as about 20 miles inland.

But the smaller rivers in Malaysia are the worst hit by our uncaring attitude towards our rivers. Sungei Kelang in KL is heavily polluted, I have no figure to back my claim but looking at the murky water I would not even jump into the river to save a drowning man. At the upper reaches, the Sungei Kelang at Ulu Kelang (about 16 km upstream) is full of dirty water from the residential areas nearby. And the Gombak River (a tributary of Kelang River) which was once upon a time have very clear water have now been polluted and is silting as well. I remember in my younger days I used to enjoy going by bus passing the Gombak River and seeing how clear the river water was. I could then even see rocks and pebbles in the clear flowing water but nowadays you can only see mud, and rubbish and sandbanks. Its a pity really.

I have not been to too may small rivers and stream in Malaysia but I know that in places where I have been most are very polluted. When I was young I thought that Sungei Kuala Kangsar, a tributary of Sungei Perak was dirty, with all the town the drains water pouring into it. Today it is dirties as more shops and houses are being built by its banks and upper reaches and more drain water pouring into the Kangsar River. And it is also now shallower with it having more sandiment in it. Then I also used to see Sungei Semantan, a tributary of Sungei Pahang. It used to have very clear water at its source, especially in Bentong Town (about 60 km upstream), and even where it joins the Pahang River at Kuala Semantan (Temerloh). Now it is dirty and murky, even at Bentong Town, and where it joins the Pahang River it is murkier and dirtier than the water of the Pahang River. So much development have taken place upriver of Sungei Semantan.

In my travel in most part of Malaysia today, I do not see any improvement to our small river system. They are all very dirty. I would challenge anyone who can show me a small river in Malaysia today which has real clear water. Ever the small rivers in Janda Baik, which is far up on the higher grounds, off Genting, is polluted. I dread the idea of swimming in them when I see how much drain water from all houses in the area have poured into it. The lower part of the river is the worse though I must say but the upper part of the river is still quite clean. But you have to go really further upriver to get to the cleaner water for a dip in the cold clear stream. But I know that many people swim in the lower part of the river.

The rivers where there are rubber and oil palm estates are the worse. Much waste from these estates are poured into the river, big or small.

In those days of you were to swim, say in the Pahang River, you could see the sand and old rotten leaves gliding on the sand flowing downstream. Even the river water tasted sweet then. Nowadays I doubt if you can see more than 2 inches into the water. It being so polluted and muddy. In those days you could even see gleaming of fish maneuvering when they swam in the river looking for food or biting into food that you throw into the river. Now you can hardly see such gleam even in cages of reared river fresh water fish. We used to say that we would know when a crocodile was coming as we could probably see the black body moving in the clear water. Nowadays you would not even see the ripples of crocodile moving as it is too murky. Probably the croc then was different, they knew us as we used to go swimming in the river. They could probably tell whether it was us and not fish. Nowadays, because of the murky and dirty water they may not even be able to tell the difference, they would probably catch us like they catch a fish; anyway there are fewer fish in the river now so the croc are probably more hungry now thus they may not even care what they catch and eat as long as they eat to survive, be it human or fish.

I cannot conclude anything from this short write up, with no facts to back me up, just my experience and from what I see. But having gone through the experience of seeing the deterioration of our river water, I am very sad to see that our rivers have gone really bad, in terms of its upkeep and cleanliness. I do not car for the slogan "Love Our River" that I see almost everywhere near rivers and waterways. I know that we Malaysians do not love our river. We think that our rivers are big drains from where we all seems to direct our small town or residential drains to. Its a more a or less a rubbish and dirty water collection point. We just do not care. We do not care for the creatures that live in these rivers, we do not care!. We think that the rivers are just ways of getting rid of our rubbish (by rubbish I even include our dirty water and sewers), we somehow knowing that all rivers flow to the sea. We do not even realise (fail to realise or do not want to realise) that when we pollute the rivers we also pollute our seas. And we eat fish from the sea and thus we eat polluted fish. Of course one may think that the sea is a big body of water, but for how long will the seas hold our rubbish; most of our rubbish are not biodegradable. So in time our seas will be full of our rubbish. Now back to the food chain, the nearest being those eating fish from the rivers. Are there still fish in the rivers?. There are still but these are getting fewer and fewer and getting smaller and smaller in size (they do not have a chance to grow, people catch them earlier or they cannibalise each other in the waters). And those that eat river water fish from the river are also eating our pollution. I know and I realise that when I was small we used to do everything in the river (and on the river). Bit mind you in those days the population was still small and whatever we "threw" into the river were mostly biodegradable and soon these were lost in the river (and some into the stomach of the river fishes). And in those days there were a lot of fish and they were large fishes, so whatever was in the river got "recycled" faster.

Do we really love our rivers? If we do we will need some sort of control (self and Governmental). I would be the first to say anyone caught throwing anything into any of our rivers should be penalised. I would also say that all drain carrying waste water should not flow into rivers. They must flow into pits first and after the water is purified then the water may flow into the river. And in towns, all town drains must have similar arrangement so that whatever river flowing through the town will be fit even for swimming in. And if rivers have sandbanks, the sandbanks must be cleared by the authority, or the town council so that rivers will flow smoothly. This may be applicable to smaller rivers of certain size but too large rivers like the Pahang River, it will be most difficult and too expensive to manage. But whatever the circumstances are people must be encouraged not to throw rubbish into these rivers and the rivers should not be used as a 'gateway' for the dirty water from their premises to be transported to the sea. I do not know if the Government will be able to control the rivers to ensure that we really "Love Our Rivers". But if say the Thames can be tamed from what it was to what it is today, I would say that we can also do the same in Malaysia. It take some time for it to happen, but there is no better time than to start now. For a start the City/Municipal/Town Councils should adopt certain measures to ensure that all rivers flowing through these Cities/ Municipalities/Towns are clean and having with clear water.


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