Floods: Family lives with anxiety as kitchen portion of house collapses due to erosion

KOTA BHARU: A family from Kampung Surau Kota here is living with anxiety as the kitchen portion of the house they have lived in for almost 40 years collapsed due to the erosion along the banks of Sungai Kelantan following the floods.

Rosmah Deraman, 48, said in the incident at about 7 pm on Saturday, the four pillars in the kitchen collapsed and causing the wooden floor to become uneven.

"At the time of the incident, I had just returned from Wakaf Che Yeh and received a call from my son, Nik Mohd Amirul Aiman Nik Lah, 15, telling me that the back of the house had been washed away by the strong river currents during the flood.

“Thankfully my children Nik Mohd Amirul Aiman, 15, and Nik Siti Norhidayah Nik Lah, 27, and two grandchildren, Nik Muhammad Adam Darwisy Nik Hilmi Khoidir, six, and Nik Nur Izara Aisyah, three, managed to escape after hearing a loud bang and found the land behind the house sliding slowly,” she said when met in Kampung Surau Kota yesterday.

Rosmah said the river erosion behind her house was found to have occurred over the past six years, which was most noticeable after the great flood ‘Bah Kuning 2014’ (yellow-coloured flood) and now the distance between the house and the river is only 0.3 metres.

Rosmah, who sells newspapers at the Wakaf Che Yeh Wholesale Market here, said that before the erosion, the house was built far from the cliff, which is 500 metres from the site of the house, but it eroded little by little every time there was a flood.

"When the monsoon season arrives, my family and I do not sleep well because we are too worried about the house being washed away by the river. Now what we feared has happened and we are lucky because there are villagers who allowed us to move into an empty house at midnight yesterday.

“This situation adds to the additional anxiety I have been suffering from thyroid disease since 1997 and chronic asthma,” she said.

She appealed for a house from relevant parties because her income is only RM20 a day just to be able to buy food and daily necessities, while her husband Nik Lah Su, 49, only earns an average of RM400 a month cutting trees.

In KUALA KRAI, more than 100 residents of Kampung Gilat had difficulty getting food supplies when the road which is their main connecting route was flooded with water as deep as three metres following the third wave of floods since Wednesday.

A resident Faridah Mat Sin, 61, said she and her family only had something light to eat the past few days with the existing food supply which they had to ration because they were worried they would run out of food.

"However, thankfully the donation arrived on time (today) when we were in dire need. This is the first contribution received by the villagers here who have had their food supply cut off since Wednesday,” said Faridah.

Earlier, she and other residents received donations of basic necessities via McDonald’s Malaysia Flood Mission in collaboration with the Kuala Krai police station. The event was attended by Kuala Krai district head Tengku Ab Rahman Tuan Yunus, Kuala Krai district police chief Supt Suzaimi Mohamad and McDonald's Malaysia East Coast Division Operations manager Safna Sepian.

Another resident of the same village, Safiah Ibrahim, 45, said she was grateful for the help of essential items provided, easing the burden of her family, especially when facing the flood disaster.

"More worrying, I have a child with special needs, aged 18, but now I am able to breathe a sigh of relief,” she said.

Meanwhile, Safna said the flood relief mission this time focused on people who were cut off by the floods and were in need of dry goods, medicines and so on.

-- BERNAMA