Foo (left) and Tiang protest the decision of the federal government not to help Sarawak in the war against rabies.
KUCHING: The Youth wing of Sarawak United People’s Party (SUPP) is strongly against the federal government’s decision not to send federal veterinary officers to Sarawak to assist the state in its fight against rabies by giving vaccinations.
Youth head Michael Tiang said such a decision should not be made by the government of the day.
“This is a new government formed by Pakatan Harapan (PH) and yet they make such decision by not sending veterinary officers to Sarawak to help fight rabies. We have new rabies cases detected almost every month.
“Are they (federal government) saying our lives are not important, that they can’t even help Sarawak?” questioned Tiang at a press conference during the party’s Annual Delegates Conference (ADC) 2018 at its headquarters here yesterday.
Tiang was reacting to The Borneo Post report yesterday that the federal veterinary department had difficulty in helping Sarawak to be rabies-free by assisting in vaccination programmes due to budget constraints.
“If the federal government said that they have budget constraints, why is that they can afford to maintain the Equanimity for RM3 million and said no budget to help us fight rabies disease,” he stressed.
He added that Sarawak is one of the biggest contributors to the national coffers (which he said was almost one third of the national coffers).
“Isn’t it fair for the federal government to give back what is owed to Sarawak, so that we can manage our own autonomy? It’s absolutely inexcusable and ridiculous of the federal government to tell us otherwise,” he said.
Meanwhile, Youth secretary Milton Foo said Sarawak has 12 members of Parliament under PH and they were headed by Deputy Minister of Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs Chong Chieng Jien and Minister of Works Baru Bian.
“What have you done to help Sarawak?” he asked both of them.