KOTA KINABALU: About 300,000 new jobs have been created in Sabah under the Economic Transformation Programme (ETP) from 2011 to 2015, the second highest in the country after Selangor.
According to a research paper entitled ‘Malaysia’s Labour Market and Job Creation under the ETP 2011 to 2015’ by Penang Institute, a total of 2.2 million new jobs have been created in the five years.
At the top of the list was Selangor with 489,600 new jobs created, followed by Sabah in second place with the creation of 297,000 new jobs.
Sharing this in an interview, Deputy Chief Minister, Datuk Seri Panglima Raymond Tan Shu Kiah, said, even Penang only recorded 61,000 new jobs created.
Although there was a high level of low-skill workers, he said, Sabah was also improving on the number of mid-skill workers.
Tan, who is also Industrial Development Minister, said the reason for the relatively high number of low-skill workers was due to the fact that most of them are at primary or secondary education level.
Nonetheless, he said, the government is moving the workers from low-skill to mid-skill and eventually high-skill through trainings.
On another note, Tan said, the 300,000 new jobs created by the government between 2011 and 2015 was three times more than Pakatan Harapan’s (PH) promise to create 100,000 jobs in Sabah within five years of its administration.
“We have created 300,000 jobs in five years. Now you tell me if PH government only produces 100,000 jobs in five years? I don’t know where they get this figure from. PH’s proposal to create 100,000 jobs in five years is too little and too late.We are already doing better than this,” he said in response to Sabah DAP publicity secretary Phoong Jin Zhe’s recent statement.
Tan believed that the BN government would continue to create more jobs and even doubled the number of new jobs to 600,000.