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SINGAPORE: More than 1,000 people took to Hong Lim Park on Sunday (Aug 16) to voice concerns over plans to develop Maju Forest and Gillman Barracks, days after the government said it would retain more greenery in response to public feedback.<\/p>\n
The participants, many decked in green and red, called for nature areas to be protected at the Maju for the People rally, organised by advocacy group SG Climate Rally.<\/p>\n
Amid the late afternoon heat, activists sat on picnic mats and held up placards bearing messages such as “Forests are our family” and “Destroying forests is not maju” \u2013 a play on the Malay word “maju”, which means progressive.<\/p>\n
Based on aerial shots of the crowd, CNA estimated the turnout at more than 1,000.<\/p>\n
The three-hour programme, which started at 3.30pm, included activities such as postcard writing, as well as speeches and sing-alongs by environmental advocates with backgrounds in ecology, economics and education, among others.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Ms Aznikah Nizar, 28, hoped the rally would spur the authorities to consider how the development plans could be reorganised without clearing the forest.<\/p>\n
“It’s not too late because they haven’t started clearing the forest yet,” said the private tutor. “My worry is that they do take feedback into account but still push through anyway. Because I think this is unlike other things, this is something that’s really irreversible.<\/p>\n
“Once the forests are gone, they are just gone.”<\/p>\n
Participants also raised broader questions about the loss of forests and natural spaces, access to nature and public participation in decisions over land use and access to information.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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SINGAPORE: More than 1,000 people took to Hong Lim Park on Sunday (Aug 16) to voice concerns over plans to develop Maju Forest and Gillman…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":76968,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/dam.mediacorp.sg\/image\/upload\/s--rQVLRjDC--\/c_crop,h_1125,w_2000,x_0,y_104\/c_fill,g_auto,h_676,w_1200\/fl_relative,g_south_east,l_mediacorp:cna:watermark:2021-08:cna,w_0.1\/f_auto,q_auto\/v1\/mediacorp\/cna\/image\/2026\/08\/16\/ayt_6033.jpg?itok=q7eym5MM","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[26272,4730,26271,3569,6412,27619,1677,40,24628],"class_list":["post-76967","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-buzz-news-sg-global","tag-barracks","tag-forest","tag-gillman","tag-hong","tag-lim","tag-maju","tag-park","tag-plans","tag-rally","wpcat-2-id"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76967","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=76967"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76967\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/76968"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=76967"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=76967"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=76967"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}