Tuan Speaker
As an elected and responsible Yang Berkhidmat, it is my obligation to raise on some important issues in my constituency as well as outside my constituency, such as traffic congestion problems, Road problems in Sarawak, Chinese Medium School, Miri general hospital, and Woman welfare.....
Traffic jam in miri
Tuan Speaker, the federal government always alleges that fuel subsidy has become a heavy financial burden to the government, and urges the people to understand that it cannot continue with the subsidy. At the same time, the government also urges the people to pay a supporting role in its progressively subsidy reducing policy; the government also encourages people to carpool (sharing transport /vehicle) so as to avoid unnecessary wastage of fuel. Due to the inflation and high price of fuel, the people are living in poverty; they have to be very careful in their expenses. Wasting of fuel may put them in a difficult situation. Therefore, the government’s suggestion may not solve any problem but make the people even angrier. The government should within its ability put more effort to show its sincerity. We know that to improve public transport system is a long term planning; but in a short term, solve or at least alleviate the traffic congestion is one of the ways that the government can do to decrease unnecessary wastage of fuel. For instance, people would only spend 15 minutes to make a certain trip during no traffic congestion period, but would spend an hour and more to make the same trip during traffic congestion period. Does it mean that more than 70% or rather most of the fuel had been wasted unnecessary? These unnecessary expanses increase the financial burden of the people and at the same time increase the government’s fuel subsidy.
Peak hour traffic jam during schooling day at SJK Krokop and SMK Chung Hua Miri
Tuan Speaker, the problems that we are facing in front of the SJK Krokop are...firstly; insufficient parking space in front of the school to enable parents to stop their vehicle while waiting for their children. Secondly, some inconsiderate parents simply park their cars in the middle of the road while fetching their children and causing traffic jam. Some even block the entrance of the houses nearby the school.
To solve the problem there …. I suggest the government would take this long school holiday as a good time, to cover the drains nearby the school in order to provide more space for parking for the parents. Secondly, traffic police officers should be present during Peak hours to control the traffic flow, to monitor the situation there, and appropriate action should be taken to discourage the stubborn public from causing unnecessary traffic jam.
Tuan Speaker, the road in front of SMK Chung Hua Miri is actually wide enough for the parents to stop and fetch their children. If traffic police officer can be present during peak hours every day to make sure that u-turn lane and the lane beside the u-turn lane are not occupied by inconsiderate parents waiting for their children, the congestion problem in front of SMK Chung Hua Miri could be alleviated easily.
Should traffic police be short of manpower, other enforcement unit such as police field force could be sent to keep the traffic in order.
Congestion of the Tudan Road
Tuan speaker, people are outraged about the congestion of the Tudan Road during the rush hours. People have to go out from the house as early as 6:00am in order to allow them to reach their office in Time at 8:00am. The existing Tudan Road is just too small and narrow, it only has two lanes, and even the “longkang” on each side of the road is wider than the road itself. The road needs to be upgraded into a four-lane freeway. People there are crying out for the government to make this a top priority.
Tuan Speaker, Traffic congestion during rush hours also happens in Piasau Bridge, and Pujut 7 Bridge.
Although we understand that the bridge expansion projects of Piasau Bridge and Pujut 7 Bridge have been already started a few months ago but people in Miri want to know the progress on these two bridge projects, they want to know when these two bridge projects can be completed. People are watching the progress of the construction of the two bridges closely and hope to see them be completed on time.
Tuan Speaker, Padang Kerbau bypass project, which can direct traffic flow from Pujut 7 congestion, also needs to be implemented. This will alleviate the congestion in Pujut 7. As the number of housing and the population in Permy Jaya area has increased gradually, to prevent heavy traffic jam in the near future, people there really hope that this project can be implemented as fast as possible.
RPR 6 miles alternative route
The existing route taken by residents of RPR 6 miles to downtown centre is extremely dangerous, because in order to reach downtown centre, they have to cross the two-lane Pujut-Lutong Highway, then turn around into Pujut-Miri Highway towards town centre.
Vehicles travelling at high speed on both sides of the highways pose great danger and threat to RPR 6 miles users attempting to make a turn around. Inevitably, over the years, numerous fatal accidents had happened.
The residents, concerned about their safety, request our government to build a safer alternative route for them. According to sources from Miri City Council, a plan has been proposed to upgrade the route, but to date no one knows what the plan is. With regard to this plan, the residents would like to be informed on the nature and details of the project, and its expected date of implementation and completion. The residents sincerely hope that there will be a safer route in the near future.
Roads of Sarawak
People of Sarawak have been marginalized although we generate so much revenues for the federal government with our natural resources such as oil and gas, minerals, timber and oil palms just to mentioned a few. If the government is to adopt a policy in reducing fuel subsidy, Sarawakian would be further marginalized which is unfair to the Sarawakian. The roads in Sarawak are in terrible conditions as compared with our peninsular counterparts. The deputy Prime Minister had once indicated that he felt embarrassed about the road in Sarawak. Look at our Pan Borneo Highway, a highway consists of only two lanes with a lot of potholes, it poses great threat to the road users travelling in high speed. Look at our Lapok Road, after 150 million ringgit had been allocated for the re-construction in year 2009, but the road condition is still in a terrible condition. Potholes can be found everywhere. During rainy season, its deplorable condition is not safe to the road users. If it is during a heavy rainy day, vehicles driving on the road would be like driving on a river. Our Miri Marudi Road, basically, is built by the logging company for the purpose of transporting logs.
During rainy season, due to its hilly, muddy and slippery terrain, it is extremely dangerous to drive on it. Other than 4wd vehicles, ordinary cars are not able to travel safely on the road. During the boat racing festival on the late September and early October this year, a lot of tourists came to Marudi. After the festival, because of raining, a lot of the tourists stayed overnight by the road side sleeping in their cars along Marudi-Miri Road. They didn’t want to take the risk of losing their lives on the dangerous slippery road.
The terrible condition of the road can be evidenced by the news reported by English paper
The terrible road conditions endanger (jeopardize) the life of the people travelling on the road and cause damages to the vehicles travelling on the road, if the government is really concerned about the safety of the Sarawakian and has sympathy for the victims and their family, the government should immediately upgrade the above mentioned road.
Chinese medium school
Tuan speaker, The Chinese Medium schools in Miri are over congested right now. There are 6 Chinese Medium Schools categorised as Class A School in Miri. All of the schools have more than 1500 students in it. Most of the classes now are over packed with 45 or more students. There is an urgent need to build more Chinese medium school in Miri. According to the standard set by our education department, one class should not exceed 35 pupils. If we are to follow this standard, at least two more Chinese medium schools should be built in Miri immediately.
Tuan speaker, all the Miri residents know that in Miri city, there are over 30 acres of vacant land near boulevard commercial centre which is used by JKR now. Why can’t the state government alienate the land into smaller lots and allocate them for the building of a much needed Chinese medium school in Miri? Only 5 acres of land is enough to build a school which can accommodate over 1000 pupils. We really hope that our state government can grant the wishes of Chinese community in Miri.
Tuan Speaker, there is another school which has been over congested and requires the state government to allocate a piece of land for its expansion plan. SJK North Miri is located on a very small piece of land at the town centre in Miri. Over the years the number of the student has increased substantially and it is now overly congested. Unfortunately, there is no land for the school to do the class room expansion. Although the school has been promised a piece of land by the state government, however, until now the school have not been given the land title yet.
Tuan Speaker, Land title should be issued immediately to SJK North Miri in order to allow the school to do the planning work as soon as possible. Since the land already being allocated to the school, what is the actually cause of the delay in the issuing of the tittle?
Tuan Speaker, All vernacular schools should be treated equally. The Pakatan Rakyat state governments provide funding for all schools in their states, regardless what is the stream of the school. Our state government is rich and with budget surplus every year, Why cannot provide little funding for the Chinese Medium Schools in Sarawak?
General Hospital in Miri
Tuan Speaker, as the main General Hospital for patients in northern Sarawak which includes those referred from Baram, Lawas, Limbang, Marudi and ulu areas, there is a calling to upgrade the Miri General Hospital from the current secondary grade to tertiary grade. As at today, despite Miri has been elevated as a City for more than 6 years, Miri GH is still not having its own Radiotherapy Unit for cancer patients who will have to travel a long way to Sarawak GH in Kuching for treatment. Furthermore, there are only limited numbers of specialists based in Miri GH and these specialists have regular travelling programs to the other hospitals to conduct clinics and training sessions. In the circumstances, patients admitted to the hospital would sometimes miss the golden opportunity to be treated on time.
Miri GH does not have in-house cardiology specialists or neurosurgeon and they have to come from Kuching on a monthly basis. This is in fact burdening the people of northern Sarawak who will have to incur more costs for travelling to Kuching to seek treatment and worse still, if they are at the critical stage, they may die for not receiving immediate treatment in time from the proper specialists. The government has spent billions of Ringgit building dams, claiming that it will benefit the people of Sarawak at large, and yet, not upgrading our general hospital or securing enough specialists to save our people’s life and health. The need to equip the Miri GH with sufficient specialists and medical facilities, and services should be carried out immediately.
Women Welfare
The objectives of the National Policy on women to ensure equitable sharing of resources and development opportunities between men and women, and the integration of women into all sectors of development in accordance with their capabilities and needs, should be borne by the government; however, it should be noted that the needs of divorced and single mothers have not been well contemplated and taken care of all this while.
The number of divorced and single mothers in Miri is generally increasing due to the increase of divorce rate. Generally, those divorced and single mothers have difficulties looking after their children or to compete at the same platform for job opportunities and earning capacity. In order to truly achieve “People first, Performance now”, this group of people in our local community and their need for safe and supportive resource centres should not be neglected. I hope that the Sarawak Government can really taking care of them.
Tuan Speaker, with that I conclude my speech. Thank you.
2 years ago
