Businesses and families continue to suffer after broken air conditioning still unfixed

Tenants in a building on Airport Road say the air-conditioning has not been working correctly since June as the landlord had refused to carry out repairs.

Shakeel Ahmed, a tailor at Josh Couture, works with a fan facing him as the building's air-condition is not up to the task. Ravindranath K / The National

ABU DHABI // Families and businesses in an Airport Road building are still without air conditioning weeks after being told it would be fixed.

Residents of the five-storey property have been without air conditioning for 12 days, the tenants say, with the temperatures reaching as high as 47°C.

The units had been working on and off since June, when The National first reported that the building owner had refused to fix it for more than two weeks.

“When customers come, they can’t even stay five minutes, 10 minutes,” said Hersie Liwanag, a store manager at Journey Toys, a business in the building. “We’re planning to close earlier today.”

She said tenants suspected that only one motor in the four-unit air-conditioning system was fixed, and there had been further breakdowns.

The building owner, Zunaid Kenaish Al Qubaisi, could not be reached for comment.

“I can’t work. I can’t stay upstairs because it’s burning. It’s like you’re in a sauna,” said Ms Liwanag.

Kashif Iqbal said the lack of air conditioning had caused business to suffer at the shop he manages, Josh Couture.

“Many people come in, but they just walk out,” he said. “The tailors are doing hard work. Sometimes they get headaches.”

Residents, mostly from the Indian state of Kerala, previously said they spent thousands of dirhams on temporary air-conditioning units and some said their children had suffered health problems because of the heat.

Building owners must conduct maintenance of key elements of their buildings, according to municipal law.

Proper planning is essential with property management, said Graham Howat, head of property asset management in the region for Jones Lang Lasalle, a real-estate company, in a previous interview.

Good facility management services also included a back-up plan for incidents such as loss of cooling, electricity, lift usage or water.

Communication, Mr Howat said, was essential.

“Landlords and management teams have to communicate with all the occupants to tell them what happened, what’s been done about it and how long it would take to get sorted out,” he said. “The biggest frustration for tenants is lack of information.”