KUCHING: Gawai Dayak is not just a festival, but also an occasion for the Dayak community to forget about their differences and find common ground.
Chief Minister Datuk Patinggi Tan Sri Adenan Satem said this is vital for the greater good of the community.
“There is nothing wrong to have differences in opinion but the common ground must be worked on all the time for the overall good of the Dayak community,” he said in his Gawai Dayak 2016 message yesterday.
Adenan said it was the desire to find common ground for the good of the Dayak community that inspired rural voters to return most of the rural seats to the Barisan Nasional in the recent state elections.
“The desire of the majority of the people to be identified with progress, development and social harmony must have been an overriding factor that
had prompted them to make decisions the way they did in entrusting the administration of the state to the team under my leadership.
“I must thank the Dayak community for playing their part in giving me an overwhelming mandate to lead the state government for the next five years,” he said.
He noted that in the last two years, the state government under his leadership had made various decisions and taken numerous actions for the benefit of Sarawakians, especially the poor and those in rural areas.
“Let me reassure our people that more decisions and actions will come your way in the next five years now that I have been given a strong mandate of my own,” he said.
Adenan said the Dayak community has progressed in the fields of education, commerce and industry in the last 50 years but this level of achievement is of course not enough as there are still areas that need to be improved on and pockets of poverty that have to be addressed.
“There are longhouses and kampung houses with all the modern trappings that look more if not better than houses in the cities but we must admit that there are also longhouses and kampung houses that look not quite pleasant and devoid of even basic amenities like electricity and clean water and good access roads,” he said.
Adenan stressed the government is fully aware of this gap and in the next five years, his administration’s focus would be on providing more infrastructure to enhance connectivity as well as providing more facilities such as water and electricity supply to improve quality of life in rural areas.
“I am confident that the newly-formed cabinet will be able to make sure that we can deliver our promises of linking up the rural areas and providing more public facilities and amenities to our rural communities,” he said.
Adenan also said the state government is also pinning its hope on the Pan Borneo Highway not only to connect places but to open up more areas along the length of the highway when it is fully completed in six years’ time.
“We envisage that the project that will pour about RM16 billion into the state’s economy will benefit the state in the long run as it is capable of generating the economy up to eight times the amount of investment,” he said.
Most importantly, he said the state government seeks to have all the powers accorded to the state according to the Federal Constitution, the Malaysia Agreement 1963 and the Inter-Governmental Committee report and recommendations to be given back to Sarawak.
“Though we have achieved some progress in the area of administrative empowerment, the process is of course complicated and it will take some time before we can get all the powers back. We want those powers back because we believe that a certain degree of autonomy will give us the space to make our own decisions in order to expedite development in Sarawak.
“God willing, and with the undivided support from all Sarawakians, I sincerely hope that we can achieve all these in the process of devolution of power back to Sarawak in the next five years,” he said.
Adenan also took the opportunity to remind Sarawakians to always be on guard against elements from outside the state that are trying to sow the seeds of hatred in our multi-ethnic and multi-religious society.
“I will not allow them to try to divide our people by coming into the state to poison the minds of our people.”