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Wednesday November 3, 2010
RM2.5m house on church land comes down
By CINDY TAN, ALLISON LAI and MARTIN CARVALHO
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MALACCA: The two-year-old controversy over a RM2.5mil mansion built illegally on church land in Kampung Baru Ayer Salak here ended when demolition work on the structure commenced. The Lim family, who built the three-storey 16-room mansion, were given a month to tear it down following a court order obtained by the Catholic Church Malacca-Johor Diocese in March. An excavator started breaking the two supporting pillars of an arch in front of the building at about 9am yesterday.
De-construction: The site of the mansion with its front wall (next to the mansion’s arch) completely torn down as of 11am yesterday.
Tenaga Nasional Berhad and Syarikat Air Melaka Berhad officials had earlier disconnected the power and water supply to the mansion. About 30 policemen were present to keep out curious villagers. Peter Lim, 44, confirmed that the family was bearing the cost of the demolition, which was expected to take three months.
His siblings, who were present, looked clearly saddened at the loss of their home. Lim added that his parents, who were in their late 70s, had moved out of the mansion a month ago. It was reported earlier that the family had demolished a single storey home to build the mansion two years ago despite knowing that it was against the church’s rules to build any structure over a single storey on its land.
Rev Bishop Paul Tan said the church would have no objection if the Lim family built another home, provided it was single-storey and was within the boundary of the earlier house. The village is home to about 120 Teochew Catholic families who settled in the area in the early 1800s. About 180 hectares of the village land was handed over to the church in the mid-1840s for the construction of the St. Mary’s church in 1886.
