By Karen Bong
KUCHING, July 20: The Ministry of Public Health, Housing and Local Government will discuss with the Ministry of Infrastructure and Port Development to come up with a mechanism to expose bad contractors in a government-wide blacklist that would bar them from getting contracts or jobs from any agencies and departments.
Minister of Public Health, Housing and Local Government Dato Sri Dr Sim Kui Hian pointed out that an inter-ministerial coordination among numerous policy actors is crucial to ensure effective implementation and monitoring of these bad contractors across the government.
“I will discuss with Datuk Amar Douglas (Uggah Embas) who is the minister-in-charge (of infrastructure) as lately, he has put so much focus on sick projects throughout Sarawak.
“That’s why the Samarahan project (to convert the five roundabouts to traffic light intersections) has restarted. I am so happy because otherwise, I will also suffer every time I want to go to the Sarawak Heart Centre,” he told the press during a doorstop interview at Padawan Municipal Council (MPP) Headquarters here today.
Dr Sim, who is also the Deputy Premier, was responding to a question as to how the local councils would share the data and information of bad contractors with other agencies including the Public Works Department (JKR) to prevent projects becoming “sick” from delay, incompletion and even sub-standard work.
“I am sure (a mechanism can be created and adopted), just like SPay (Sarawak’s e-wallet system) which (can be used) across all different agencies.
“We will discuss this because all agencies may have different systems. So there is a need for us to coordinate among ourselves,” he added.
Dr Sim also mentioned that the problems could arise in the tender process which is always very challenging due to the pricing.
“We are aware of the situation where a blacklisted contractor at one agency can go to another agency and this happened in the local councils to DID (Department of Irrigation and Drainage),” he added.
Last Saturday (July 16), Dr Sim highlighted that its ministry will look into setting up a tool to share the data and information of bad contractors who acted incompetently in councils’ projects across the government in order to bar them from receiving or procuring any jobs from other agencies and departments.
Earlier on, Dr Sim witnessed the swearing-in ceremony for MPP chairman Lo Khere Chiang, deputy chairman Senator Dato Ahmad Ibrahim and 26 councillors whose terms have been extended until the end of the year.
Kota Sentosa assemblyman Wilfred Yap was also present. — DayakDaily
