An elderly resident at a Havelock Road HDB block says he has spent the past two years dealing with dog faeces repeatedly left along the common corridor outside his home, with the animal’s owner attributing the problem to a faulty gate.
The resident, who lives at Block 22 Havelock Road, told Shin Min Daily News that his neighbour’s white Pomeranian has allegedly wandered out of the unit and defecated near his flat and other homes two to three times a week.
The repeated incidents have become particularly difficult for the elderly man, who said mobility problems now make it harder for him to approach the dog’s owner each time the mess appears.
Dog allegedly leaves mess several times a week
The resident said he initially tried to resolve the matter directly by approaching the dog’s owner and asking the family to clean up after their pet.
However, he claimed the problem continued despite his complaints to the relevant authorities.
He was reportedly advised to install a CCTV camera to document the incidents.
One video, dated Sept 28, allegedly shows the Pomeranian leaving its owner’s flat, walking along the corridor and defecating near the resident’s front door at about 4am.
The resident said similar incidents have occurred repeatedly, sometimes outside his unit and at other times near his neighbours’ homes.
Whenever the faeces are discovered, he said someone has to be contacted to clean the affected area.
But for the elderly resident, simply removing the waste does not address the underlying problem.
He said residents should not have an issue with others keeping pets, but pet owners should also take responsibility for keeping shared public spaces clean.
CCTV captured another incident
The resident also provided another piece of footage from August 2025.
According to his account, the video showed a young man believed to be the dog’s owner’s son picking up faeces near the corridor and allegedly throwing it from the building.
Later that same evening, the dog was reportedly seen defecating along the corridor again.
The resident said he subsequently asked the man’s family to clean up the waste.
He described the continuing situation as distressing and said he felt he had limited options for dealing with the problem.
The account of the alleged disposal of the faeces comes from the resident and the footage he provided to the media. It has not been independently established that the man seen in the video was responsible for the act as alleged.
Dog owner blames faulty gate
The dog’s owner, identified by Shin Min Daily News by the surname Lin, disputed the suggestion that the animal was deliberately allowed to roam the corridor.
Lin said the family’s metal gate was faulty and could not be properly secured.
During the newspaper’s visit, he reportedly demonstrated that the gate could reopen even after he tried to close it.
According to Lin, the Pomeranian sometimes slips out when he is too tired after work or when his children are not paying attention.
He said there was no reason for him to intentionally train the dog to defecate outside a neighbour’s home.
Lin also said that if the family is informed about an incident, they would clean up the waste.
The dog has reportedly been with the family for about three years, and Lin said his children walk it every day.
Some neighbours say they were not affected
The dispute does not appear to have affected every resident in the block.
When reporters visited the Havelock Road block, some neighbours said they had not experienced problems with the dog or its behaviour.
That suggests the dispute is concentrated around particular units and sections of the common corridor rather than affecting the entire block.
Still, for the resident who says he has repeatedly encountered the dog’s faeces outside his home, the issue has become a long-running source of frustration.
Shared spaces remain a responsibility
The case highlights a familiar challenge in Singapore’s densely populated HDB estates, where corridors, lift lobbies and other areas are shared by residents.
Pet ownership itself is not the issue raised by the elderly resident. His complaint is that pet owners should ensure their animals do not leave waste in common areas and that any mess is cleaned promptly.
For residents living close to one another, even a relatively small hygiene problem can become a recurring source of tension when it is not resolved at its source.
In this case, the resident wants the repeated incidents to stop rather than relying on authorities to clean up after each occurrence.
For the dog owner, meanwhile, the immediate problem appears to be preventing the Pomeranian from slipping through the faulty gate in the first place.
Until that issue is resolved, the two sides remain at odds over a problem that has already persisted for two years.
