Fatimah (centre) hands out welfare aid to a recipient. At right is Lau.
SIBU: A total of 7,362 recipients throughout the state will receive extra financial assistance under the ‘Bouquet of Love’ programme rolled out in conjunction with the Chinese New Year celebration.
Minister of Welfare, Community Well Being, Women, Family and Childhood Development Dato Sri Fatimah Abdullah said the recipients will receive an extra RM100 on top of their monthly assistance.
“We have this ‘Bouquet of Love’ every year so that the needy would not feel left out during this festive season.
“We also want them to be able to feel the festive mood,” she said during an event here yesterday.
The event saw 200 of the 2,097 recipients here presented with a hamper worth RM50 in addition to the extra RM100.
The rest of the recipients will have the money deposited into their respective bank accounts.
Meanwhile, Fatimah revealed that a total of 57,588 recipients throughout the state received monthly assistance from the state Welfare Department last year.
“We spent about RM192.51 million to help these recipients,” she pointed out, adding that there are six categories of the assistance scheme.
Out of the six categories, Fatimah said the ‘Bantuan Orang Tua’ (BOT) has the highest number of cases at 22,509, with aid given out totalling RM80.99 million.
For Sibu alone, she revealed that 8,484 recipients received monthly welfare allowances last year, totalling RM28.21 million.
Meanwhile, Temenggong Dato Vincent Lau encouraged the recipients to improve their families’ social economic status by ‘learning to fish’.
“You can learn to trade or by getting involved in small businesses, so that you may earn an honest livelihood and not be forced to the alternative of holding out your hand for charity all the time,” he said.
Lau believed with assistance from the Welfare Department, recipients who are still productive could eventually become self-reliant and financially independent.
District officer Awang Yusof Awang Mostapha, Temenggong Datuk Wan Hamid Edruce and Temenggong Stanley Geramong were among those present.