KUCHING, Oct 8: Sarawak United People’s Party (SUPP) Stakan branch welcomes Chief Minister Datuk Patinggi Abang Johari Tun Openg’s recent announcement where he said that the Sarawak government is looking to formulate an insurance scheme to provide financial assistance to senior citizens in the State.
Its chairman Datuk Sim Kiang Chiok in a statement today said while Sarawak is expected to become a high income nation by 2030, Sarawak is also expected to have about 20 per cent of its population aged over 60-years-old by that time.
“Sarawakian will be assured that by investing their life and effort into Sarawak they will be taken care of for their effort in growing Sarawak together as their home.
“Our chief minister is doing a great job in keeping us safe from harm while seeking and setting a policy for us to live with dignity when we are old, and it shows his good character that deserve our support as our leader to take us through this pandemic and towards our golden years,” he said.
“He knows that when we are in our 70s, we will be mostly be unemployable and when we in our 80s, we would run of cash in our Employees Provident Fund (EPF).
“Now it is even more pressing that some of us have drawn our savings in our EPF to get through the Covid-19 pandemic and its very reassuring that our chief minister understands this, and he will act on it so that we can enjoy our golden years with dignity rather than living in poverty,” added Sim.
Apart from that, he opined that with the expected increase of income from the chief minister’s initiative to impose State Sales Tax (SST) on the Oil and Gas production, and modern industrial investment, Sarawak’s cash reserves will increase exponentially by 2030 and its income will also grow annually.
On Oct 6, Chief Minister Abang Johari Tun Openg announced that the Sarawak government is formulating an insurance scheme that will provide a form of financial assistance to senior citizens in Sarawak to cope with their retirement years with the higher cost of living in the future. — DayakDaily
