Residents in Hung Hom fear building collapse similar to To Kwa Wan tragedy

Residents of rundown blocks in Hung Hom fear they will suffer the same fate as the building that collapsed in nearby To Kwa Wan, leaving four dead.

They are worried that maintenance work has not been carried out despite the Buildings Department warning the owners of the flats.

Kowloon City district councillor Pius Yum Kwok-tung said that since the five-storey tenement in Ma Tau Wai Road was reduced to rubble on January 29, his phone had been ringing almost non-stop.

'We cannot afford to have another tragedy like this. But then it is shocking to learn that the Buildings Department has failed to look into the problem while it understands the full extent of it,' Yum said.

He said many residents in Hung Hom reported structural safety problems to the department and in some cases maintenance orders had been issued, but few repair works had been done.

'Take a 52-year-old building in Gillies Avenue South as an example. A ground-floor premises was abandoned for more than 10 years. Peeling concrete and exposed steel reinforcing rods can be seen, though the Buildings Department issued the owner with an order to fix the problems in June 2008,' Yum said.

The owner turned a blind eye. While others carried out maintenance recently, the owner of ground floor premises refused to fix his property. 'The owner of a flat above it [the ground floor flat] moved out years ago as his floor tilted to one side and he fears the place will collapse,' Yum said.