By Karen Bong
KUCHING, June 28: The federal government has allocated RM10.5 million to Sarawak for the first phase of survey works on Native Customary Rights (NCR) land, including under Section 6 and 18 of the State Land Ordinance.
Deputy Chief Minister Datuk Amar Douglas Uggah Embas emphasised that the allocation was to continue land survey initiatives that had been carried out by the state.
“I want to record my gratitude and appreciation to the federal government for the support given on the issue pertaining to native land. I also hope that issues on native land can continue to be resolved over time,” he told a press conference today.
He highlighted this after co-chairing the second State Action Council Meeting together with Works Minister Baru Bian at a leading hotel here today.
Uggah also expressed his appreciation to Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohammad for appointing him as the co-chairman of the council, representing the state government, to oversee the implementation of federal projects approved in Sarawak
“This is a historical and meaningful collaboration as it demonstrated the close relationships between the state and federal governments.
“I agree with the minister (Baru) that we should not politicise the projects as what is important is that Sarawak and Putrajaya must work together to plan and implement all projects for the benefit of the people of Sarawak,” he said.
Most importantly, Uggah emphasised the collaboration was to ensure that Sarawak gets as much development projects as possible as the state was lacking behind in a number of sectors.
“We hope in the future this can be addressed. I have given my assurance to YB (Baru) that the state government machinery and agencies will cooperate with the federal side to ensure the implementation of projects in Sarawak according to schedule and desired outcome,” he added.
Earlier, Baru revealed that up until June 23 this year, there were 631 federal projects implemented under the 4th Rolling Plan of the 11th Malaysia Plan (11MP) in the state of Sarawak with a total allocation of RM4.31 billion.
However, he said that the current expenditure performance for the state recorded was only RM711 million or 16.5 per cent as compared to 42.51 per cent or RM23.3 billion for the national expenditure performance.
On the physical performance of the 631 projects, 442 projects were on schedule, 69 projects had been completed, six projects were delayed or ‘sick’, eight projects still in planning stages, 102 projects ahead of schedule and four projects under review status. — DayakDaily
