This article first appeared in The Edge Malaysia Weekly on August 17, 2026 - August 23, 2026

Segambut MP Hannah Yeoh has spent years pressing the government to protect Kuala Lumpur’s green spaces. Now, as Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department (Federal Territories), she can act on issues she once raised from outside the administration.

Her appointment in last December’s midterm cabinet reshuffle gives her a shorter window to carry out her plans. Rather than launching major construction projects, she is focusing on quick changes that future administrations will find hard to reverse.

“I don’t have five years to construct things. So, I look at what the people of KL have been upset about. The number one issue has been the lack of open space and green spaces being taken away,” she says.

Yeoh has represented Segambut since 2018. Her appointment makes her the first Kuala Lumpur MP to oversee the Federal Territories portfolio since 2009, when Tan Sri Zulhasnan Rafique, then Setiawangsa MP, left the post.

That distinction matters in a city where residents do not elect their mayor or local councillors. Kuala Lumpur MPs often end up handling development disputes, public housing and local infrastructure —issues that, elsewhere, fall to councillors or elected state representatives.

The long-running Taman Rimba Kiara dispute illustrates how Yeoh’s move into the ministry has expanded her influence. As Segambut MP, she could support residents, raise objections and press agencies to act, but she had no formal authority over Yayasan Wilayah Persekutuan (YWP), the landowner behind the contested development.

As the minister in charge of the Federal Territories and chair of YWP, she holds a formal role in board decisions and is able to lead negotiations with the developer, residents and Kuala Lumpur City Hall (DBKL).

“For the last seven years, I have been shouting from the outside as a member of parliament, lending my voice in court with the residents,” she says. “With this reshuffle, the Federal Territories minister is also chair of YWP, the landowner. Together with my board, we asked how we could do what was right and surrender the park back to DBKL as green space.”

A settlement announced in 2026 confines development to 5.76 acres, with the remaining land involved in the deal to be returned to DBKL and gazetted as public green space. Each of the 98 longhouse families will also receive two free homes, with the replacement units to be completed before the existing longhouses are demolished.

The settlement follows a dispute that began in 2016, before Yeoh became Segambut MP. The campaign was led by residents, the Taman Tun Dr Ismail Residents’ Association and the Save Taman Rimba Kiara Working Group, with other civil groups supporting the campaign.

In 2023, the Federal Court upheld the decision to quash the development order, setting the legal basis for the negotiations and the settlement that followed.

Beyond Taman Rimba Kiara, Yeoh also supported efforts to protect the wider Bukit Kiara area. During her first term as Segambut MP, 111ha of Taman Persekutuan Bukit Kiara was gazetted in 2020 as Malaysia’s first federal park following years of campaigning by residents and Friends of Bukit Kiara.

After a rare firefly species was recorded there in 2025, Yeoh also called for a buffer zone to protect its habitat. As minister, she later announced a minimum 300m buffer along the front portion of the park, following objections to two proposed 30-storey residential towers.

Yeoh has initiated discussions on the disputed Bukit Dinding development in Wangsa Maju, Setiawangsa, though the issue remains unresolved.

Among Yeoh’s first actions in office was to establish a task force to identify and gazette KL’s green spaces. DBKL also published the locations of 543 gazetted green and open spaces, while the task force continues to add more sites each month.

Gazettement gives each site a defined legal status and records its approved public use. It does not guarantee permanent protection, but any attempt to remove that status would require Cabinet approval, public display and public hearings, she says.

“The entire exercise is meant to make it more difficult for anyone to undo these good things, but it is not fool-proof because any law can still be amended, but I aim to make it difficult in future for anyone to sell this land.”

The published list identifies each site by location rather than only by its land-title details, allowing residents to see which spaces are protected and flag commercial activity or other misuse.

Yeoh acknowledges that this scrutiny may expose sites that are not functioning as proper parks, but says that it is part of improving transparency.

Securing the sites’ legal status first also gives DBKL a firmer basis to take enforcement action later.

“If I did not provide the public with the list, they would not know which sites are gazetted. From now until Parliament is dissolved, my first mandate is to gazette these spaces. Enforcement can happen later,” she says.

Yeoh’s push to protect green spaces is also central to her flood mitigation strategy. She envisions Kuala Lumpur as a “sponge city”, where parks, trees, soil and detention ponds absorb and retain rainwater, slowing its flow into drains and rivers.

This approach treats parks as city infrastructure that can reduce heat, support recreation and lower flood risk. After the severe floods of December 2021, Yeoh and other Kuala Lumpur MPs sought investigations into six retention ponds approved or transferred for development.

Now, she has formed a flood-mitigation task force to strengthen the city’s water-storage capacity. With little land available for new ponds, DBKL is also working with planners, architects and landscape professionals on nature-based solutions, including storage systems beneath parks. Yeoh says more than 60 private detention ponds have also been created.

She says the cost of such measures must also be weighed against the losses faced by households and the government when floods occur, including infrastructure repairs and assistance for affected families.

“There are many hidden costs to the government that you don’t see. Just because DBKL does not pay for it does not mean it is not costing taxpayers,” she says.

The social value of these spaces also depends on who can use them. Yeoh stresses that gazetted green spaces will only be meaningful if people have physical access to them.

For residents of People’s Housing Projects, the problem is not only the lack of open space near their homes but also the difficulty of reaching larger parks elsewhere.

Since taking office, Yeoh has reintroduced free aerobics programmes in public housing areas and asked DBKL to study new Go KL routes connecting PPR communities with major parks in the morning and evening. DBKL spends about RM40 million a year on the free bus service.

In effect, she wants parks to serve as a free third space, a place outside the home where residents can meet, exercise and spend time without having to visit shopping malls or other commercial venues.

DBKL has also extended the operating hours of selected major parks, allowing them to open as early as 5.30am and remain open until midnight on Fridays and Saturdays.

Yeoh says these measures could also reduce isolation and support the mental well-being of older PPR residents.

She has also asked DBKL to prepare an inventory of the facilities available across its gazetted parks and open spaces, and to identify where basic improvements are needed.

The minister says even a simple park should have a walking or jogging track because it can be used by children, adults and older people without specialised equipment.

The same principle shapes her approach to redevelopment. Yeoh wants new projects to create public parks rather than simply provide open space that offers little practical use.

Plot ratio measures how much floor space can be built relative to the size of a site, with a higher ratio generally allowing a denser development. Under Yeoh’s proposal, developers seeking a higher plot ratio would have to build upwards and set aside part of the site for a new public park.

“If you want to go up, you must surrender and create meaningful green space. That means a new park is being created out of the redevelopment,” she says.

For Yeoh, meaningful green space cannot be leftover land or a facility intended for only one activity.

“I don’t want just open space. That is meaningless unless you put in a jogging track. Not everyone can play football, but the young and the old can use a jogging track,” she says.

However, she says the guidelines have not been finalised, so their impact will depend on how DBKL defines these requirements and enforces public access.

For Yeoh, protecting green spaces also requires greater transparency in city planning. Legal safeguards have limited value if residents only learn about a proposed land-use change after key decisions have been made.

Under her direction, DBKL now publishes One Stop Centre (OSC) development applications online. Previously, residents often depended on signboards near project sites for information about new proposals and public hearings. Resident groups have long complained that this approach can leave people unaware of a project until the planning process is already underway.

Publishing the applications online allows residents across the city to check proposed developments and land-use changes without having to live near the affected site.

She adds that Kuala Lumpur mayor Datuk Seri Fadlun Mak Ujud has adopted Rule 3 under the Federal Territory of Kuala Lumpur Planning Rules 2025, which makes public consultation mandatory when a proposal departs from the Kuala Lumpur Local Plan.

Another major governance change is Yeoh’s decision not to convene Special One Stop Centre, (OSC Khas) meetings. Unlike the regular OSC chaired by the mayor, the special committee is chaired by the Federal Territories minister and can consider matters such as higher plot ratios.

“OSC Khas allows the minister to increase the plot ratio or do anything the minister wants. For example, as minister, I am not subject to any professional training or qualification, but I can override the mayor, which I do not want [to do],” she says.

Yeoh stresses that the committee has not yet been formally abolished, as this requires Cabinet approval.

“As long as I am Federal Territories minister, I will no longer call an OSC Khas meeting. At the same time, we are submitting a Cabinet paper to revoke and abolish it,” she says.

Yeoh acknowledges that future administrations could still reverse these protections, but her goal is also to ensure residents have enough time and information to respond to any proposed change. “The whole idea is to delay the process so that nothing can happen in secret.”

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