By Karen Bong
SERIAN, Sept 23: Chief Minister Datuk Patinggi Abang Johari Tun Openg has again called on the people of Sarawak to be united and focused on taking care of Sarawak as certainty is needed than meddling in other people’s business.
“People must be united and give strong support to the current leadership to allow and enable greater efforts to continue in developing Sarawak.
“Whatever ‘rusty’ and happenings or people fighting each other in other places, that’s their problem. We take care of our state and people.
“People of Sarawak take care of Sarawak. People of Serian take care of Serian. So that we can build a bright future for our children,” he emphasised at the Leaders Meet People Programme here today.
The Gabungan Parti Sarawak (GPS) government, Abang Johari pointed out, wanted to do more for Sarawak as plannings were in the pipeline for the next five years which could generate more income or revenue for Sarawak.
“I can’t inform (the plans) yet as we are still planning (involving) revenue engineering. This is our approach,” he said while giving the example of the State Sales Tax (SST) on petroleum products which had generated an additional RM3 billion for the state.
With Sarawak’s ability to manage its finances well, he pledged that GPS will continue to give the best to take care of the welfare and wellbeing of the people.
“With more income, we can materialise the new state-owned private international school, which I had announced yesterday (Sept 22), to cater for our children irrespective of race especially from underprivileged communities.
“We realised it is expensive to send children to private schools but we want to let our farmers’ and fishermen’s children to also have the opportunity to study in international schools,” he added.
As long as GPS is the government, Abang Johari reassured that the state government will pay for the tuition fees to enable underprivileged children to receive free but quality education.
On the 11th meeting of the State Development Coordination Committee on Projects which he chaired earlier today, Abang Johari reported that all projects in Serian were implemented well and smoothly.
“Most importantly, Serian is developing rapidly as an uprising town with latest facilities like a complex, convention centre and recreational green area which have incurred substantial expenses.
“The People’s Project was implemented well including water and electricity supplies,” he shared.
Abang Johari emphasised that the future of Serian is bright because the hinterland can be developed with agriculture and other industries like tourism as Serian is not far from Kuching city.
“The state government is also undertaking a study currently to elevate Siburan into a full district.
“With planning as such, what we want is a peaceful and harmonious Serian under the Bidayuh majority community which will continue to be united and play a major role in developing sarawak, more so in Serian,” he added. — DayakDaily
