By Adrian Lim
KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 18: Sibuti MP Lukanisman Awang Sauni is calling on the federal government to create a special committee to look into solving the issue of dilapidated schools in Sarawak and Sabah.
He noted that the Education Ministry was allocated a huge sum of budget amounting to RM50.4 billion in Budget 2021.
Nonetheless, Lukanisman said the allocation to repair and upgrade the dilapidated schools in Sarawak and Sabah was insufficient.
“I am fed up to hear about the allocation to repair dilapidated schools which are just ‘alang-alang’ (not enough).
“It does not provide a total solution for the repair and upgrade of dilapidated schools
“The other big issues are schools which are in bad conditions and lack of students.
“And the federal government also did not provide solutions on the merging of schools which are needed,” he said when debating the national budget 2021 at the Parliament here today.
Lukanisman pointed out that the Education Ministry did not formulate a solution for students in rural areas when the ministry decided to close schools nationwide recently due to Covid-19 infection in the country.
He said Sibuti is an area that is classified as a green zone of Covid-19 but students in the area have to undergo online-based learning.
Lukanisman pointed out that students in rural areas faced challenges to undergo online classes as there is a lack of Internet connectivity in rural areas.
He claimed that the closure of schools nationwide taken by the Education Ministry was Peninsular centric as it did not take into consideration the students in the rural areas such as SK Rumah Essau, SK Sg Bakas in Sarawak.
Lukanisman said there were some teachers in the rural areas who had to bring their students to get across rivers, climb mountains in order to obtain Internet connection for their studies.
Thus, he also urges the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) to look into solving the issue of lack of Internet connectivity in the rural areas. —DayakDaily
