Zahid approves fund from his own allocation to build new house for family of rabies victims

The family of the two children from Kampung Paun Rimu Bakung near here who died of rabies infection will receive special assistance from Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Dr Ahmad Zahid Hamidi to build their new house.

Human Resources Minister and Serian MP Datuk Seri Richard Riot said the announcement was made by the Deputy Prime Minister when chairing the cabinet meeting on Wednesday in Putrajaya.

Without going into finer details of the allocation, Riot said the amount is more than RM60,000 in order to build a house that is an upgrade from Hardcore  Poor Housing Project (PPRT) houses.

“He (Zahid) said, ‘I will use my own allocation as the Deputy Prime Minister’ to assist the family’ after I told the cabinet meeting of the plight of this family and the condition of the house which they live in.

“The Serian District Office has received instruction from the federal government and the tendering to choose the contractor will be held next Monday. In other words, it means immediate action is being taken to assist the family and we expect the new house to be completed, at most, within three months (after commencement of construction),” he told reporters after presentation of government grants at Dewan Masyarakat Serian yesterday.

It is learnt from the village chief Stephen Empudot, who was also present, that a site for the new house had already been identified.

Responding to his absence at the funeral of the two dead siblings, Riot explained that he was in fact at Paon Rimu Bakung on Tuesday before the bodies were brought home from Sarawak General Hospital (SGH).

“I could not attend the funeral because that very night I had to fly to Kuala Lumpur to attend the cabinet meeting (the next day), during which I brought to the attention of the cabinet on the dilapidated condition of the home of the family,” he said, adding that he noted the wild allegations made against him in the social media.

On a related matter, Riot said he welcomed the suggestion to create an education trust fund to manage the monetary contributions made to the families of the rabies victims, in order to assist their remaining four sibilings to succeed in education and lift their family out of poverty.

He also said chief minister’s wife Datin Amar Dato Jumaani Tuanku Bujang made the right move by making sure any donations for the family to go through Dayak Bidayuh National Association (DBNA), which will also closely monitor the education development and upbringing of the remaining siblings.

“As the Serian MP, I express gratitude for the kindness of the people of Sarawak towards this family. I’m happy a lot of people have chipped in to assist,” he said.

Having said that, he slammed some irrresponsible social media postings that implicated Serian was unsafe following the rabies outbreak and the deaths of the two siblings Monica Mazlan and Jackson Mazlan.

“Suddenly, Serian becomes very famous for the wrong reason. But, I as the Member of Parliament, want to assure everyone that Serian is still as safe as ever, and life goes on as usual.

“Don’t be scared to go to Serian and the villages here,” he said.

Earlier in his speech, Riot advised the village folks in Serian against keeping many dogs as pets if they could not take proper care of them.

“I noticed some families even keep up to 10 dogs. What’s the use of keeping so many dogs if you do not take good care of them,” he said.

He expressed confidence that the rabies outbreak can be controlled since the federal government is assisting the state government with vaccines to vaccinate the dogs and other animals in the affected areas.

Also present yesterday were political secretary to the Human Resources Minister, Datuk Mejar (R) Peter Runin, Serian district officer Lim Hock Meng and Serian Division Bidayuh Temenggong Henry Bujang Sadok

Source:
courtesy of THE BORNEO POST

by Samuel Aubrey

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