JOHOR BAHRU - A NEW metropolis three times the size of neighbouring Singapore is taking shape in the foothills of southern Malaysia, where officials and investors have equally huge ambitions for the city.
Dust billows across the horizon as sun-scorched construction crews lay roads, drainage canals, street lamps, power stations and other key installations for a development known as Iskandar Malaysia.
Rolling terrain once covered with palm oil plantations and bush has been bulldozed to make way for theme parks, luxury homes, international schools, hotels, hospitals, a movie studio and a business district by 2025.
In short, a new Singapore is being built in an area covering 2,217 sq km in Johor state. Iskandar, one of five 'economic growth corridors' Malaysia is developing, was launched in 2006 and will integrate existing towns, seaports and an airport with the new projects being built from scratch.
But instead of pitting it as a rival to the rich city-state, Malaysia is asking Singapore investors to take part in the project.
'We see ourselves as collaborating because both countries realise that in order to create more wealth and better distribution of the wealth, we need each other,' said Ismail Ibrahim, chief executive of the Iskandar Regional Development Authority (IRDA). 'Investors see Iskandar as something that is believable, something that is working,' he told AFP.
-- AFP