KUCHING, Aug 1: The ‘Greater Kuching’ concept will be the catalyst for turning the state capital into an ultra-modern city in the near future, said Kuching South City Council (MBKS) mayor Datuk Wee Hong Seng.
Adopting the idea of ‘Urban Renewal of Greater Kuching’, Wee spoke of how Kuching was heading towards becoming a smart and healthy city on Kuching City Day’s 32nd anniversary held at MBKS headquarters today.
“Kuching is also known as a ‘City of Unity’ – Your City, My City, Our City. ‘Greater Kuching’ is among the various catalyst projects to connect to the Old and New Kuching within the purview of MBKS and DBKU. It is one of the reversible development strategies in anticipation of potential future changes. With this idea of ‘Greater Kuching’, it will re-brand the city with a new image of a better city for the people.”
He cited how MBKS had created pedestrian and cycling networks to connect iconic places in the city and how Kuching city dwellers too had a role to play in developing Kuching into a better city for everyone to live in.
“This is our home, our Kuching, our responsibility. It is a responsibility I know we all accept willingly as members of this community. It is a responsibility that guides us in our thought and deeds and it’s a responsibility that will ensure that we leave this a better place than we found it,” he stressed.
Wee also said that in the past 11 months, MBKS and DBKU had reinvented themselves by developing strong policies and demonstrated the two councils’ ability to address the needs of Kuching’s multicultural and diverse community.
“Both MBKS and DBKU were moving in tandem with the rakyat interest and have since become an efficient intermediary an implemented of policies enacted by the government of the day. We carry our duties based on the concept of integrity, accountability, and transparency,” he said.
He also highlighted MBKS’ initiatives in digitalising Kuching city in line with the Sarawak government’s digital economy agenda to further enhance its capability to serve the people.
“In line with this initiative, MBKS earlier introduced the i-People Application – a digital platform that allows interaction and communication between Kuchingites and MBKS, where feedbacks, alerts, suggestions and notices can be conveyed to the council effectively.
“Also, we have implemented the digital Smart Traffic System to smoothen traffic. Flow during congestion time,” he said.
Wee added that MBKS has also executed the digitalisation of building plans to make business processes more efficient.
“We have integrated Augmented Reality (AR) at MBKS Pictorial Gallery where visitors can experience the beautiful history of Kuching City through a different perspective, the AR way. We shall continuously enhance our operations with innovative technological features and to orientate the citizens into adopting them,” he said.
Meanwhile, Wee also said that MBKS took the initiative to help curb the Covid-19 pandemic by developing Qmunity App, through its corporate social responsibility exercise in collaboration with JT Utama Sdn Bhd to track Covid-19 outbreak in Sarawak.
“The App’s role is to assist the Sarawak authorities ion its efforts to trace the movement of people for contact tracing. The location history of a person can then be established and be contacted in case of any emergency. Currently, the App has about 372,226 users,” added Wee. —DayakDaily
