KUCHING, April 14: Democratic Action Party (DAP) Sarawak Chief Chong Chieng Jen claims that Senari Port’s computerised container retrieval system has yet to be fixed following its outage two weeks ago.
Chong said though it was claimed by the Kuching Port Authority (KPA) General Manager Robert Lau that: “By today, the volume of delivery and receiving has returned to the normal volume before the incident”, he believed that in actual fact, there are still containers that could not be located as the computer system has yet to be restored to full working condition.
“As I understand from the ground, the computer system that broke down two weeks ago has still not been restored and is not in operation.
“At present, an alternative system is being used and certain procedures are still done manually,” said Chong in a statement after visiting the port today.
Meanwhile, Chong, who is also Kota Sentosa assemblyman, pointed out that KPA staff at Senari Port were doing their best to clear the backlog of containers stuck at the port due to the outage.
While the ground operators are struggling to meet the demand of the customers, such as the hauliers, forwarding agents and shipping agents, Chong said KPA’s top management should review their policy.
“This computer system outage is just part of a larger problem.
“The privatisation of most of the port services implemented a few years ago, though have enriched a small group of people, have not brought about much improvement to the services provided by KPA to the users. Thus, there is a need to review such a privatisation policy,” said Chong.
Five days ago, Chong issued a statement questioning the reason behind the delay in fixing Kuching Port Authority’s Senari Port’s computer system, which he alleged has been malfunctioning.
He claimed the computer system malfunction has cut the efficiency of container retrievals by more than 50 per cent. — DayakDaily
