An elderly joss-stick maker born in the year of the Rooster is crowing with happiness at receiving a Chinese New Year ang pow from Keretapi Tanah Melayu (KTMB) -permission for him to continue his with business on its land.
For the past year, Liew Chin Nam (right), 65, was in a dilemma when he was ordered both by the Kinta district land office and KTMB to vacate the railway land in Kanthan, Chemor, Perak where his family had been making the joss sticks for half a century.
His troubles came when KTMB initiated its double-tracking railway project under Gamuda, putting him under tremendous pressure to vacate the land.
Liew (right) had sought the help of Parti Sosialis Malaysia (PSM) which took his case to the Ipoh High Court on July 5, 2009, after officials from the land office had threatened to demolish his joss-stick factory by July 15 last year.
Peaceful end to woe
Both PSM deputy president M Saraswathy and party national coordinator K Kunasekaran played a major roll in Liew's right to be recognised as a legal tenant of KTMB.
On Oct 29 last year, Liew also received a notice of eviction from the Railway Assets Corporation (RAC) - a KTMB subsidiary.
On Nov 5 , both parties decided to settle the matter out of court and a week later, Liew received a letter from RAC offering a 1,430 square metre parcel of land adjacent to his present factory site.
RAC also told Liew to vacate the land by Nov 30 and the new month rental was pushed up to RM429 from the previous RM125.
However, Liew sort an extension for vacating the premises as he had RM20,000 worth of Chinese New Year's orders to meet.
Finally, Liew shifted his factory to the adjacent area after spending about RM15,000 in the construction of the new factory with Gamuda pitching in with RM5,000 .
An excited Liew threw a Chinese New Year lunch today at the premises of his new factory attended by PSM members, other NGOs and the media.
He said that he will start operating his factory on March 1 and hopes to expand his business to other areas in Malaysia and Singapore through his high quality scented joss-sticks.
