Chong (fourth left, seated) poses with PH Sarawak leaders prior to the press conference.
KUCHING: Pakatan Harapan (PH) Sarawak is finalising the list of candidates for the Village Community Management Council (MPKK), an instrument of the federal government to reach out to rural folk in the state.
Its chairman Chong Chieng Jen said PH Sarawak, which is responsible for the selection of candidates, would soon submit the list for an approval of the Ministry of Rural Development.
He said each committee of the MPKK would comprise a chairman, a secretary and 11 members, and all committees would each be given annual grant of RM10,000 to carry out their respective activities.
It is learnt that there are 5,900 villages and longhouses throughout Sarawak.
“I’ll urge GPS (Gabungan Parti Sarawak) not to be so worried about the appointment of MPKK. It’s for the benefits of the people in rural areas,” he told a press conference after chairing the state PH meeting held at the Democratic Action Party (DAP) headquarters here today.
Chong, who is Deputy Minister of Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs (KPDNHEP), said the role and function of MPKK would be disseminating information on assistance and programmes offered by the PH government to the rural community across Sarawak.
He said various programmes by the PH government had been hampered by the directive of the state government which ‘disallowed ketua kampung to attend events held by the federal government’.
He said programmes such as MySalam, iSuri, grants for entrepreneurs as well as talks on consumerism organised by KPDNHEP were meant for the people, but information on these seemed not circulated on the ground.
As such, he believed that MPKK would serve as a faster and more efficient platform to disseminate information and reach out to the rural folk.
“MPKK is not to replace ketua kampung or tuai rumah. They have different roles. People of rural areas will benefit from the setting up MPKK.
Asked how soon the MPKK would be implemented, Chong said: “The first batch will be submitted end of next month, so some appointments will be made by November.”
He opined that the process could be expedited with the help of resident offices (ROs) and district offices (DOs) in Sarawak.
“Given that we did not receive all the help from ROs and DOs, it slows down the process.”
According to Chong, the rural folk in Sarawak would be happy with the setting up of MPKK.
He said the rural folk would not want to be deprived of the assistance and programmes offered by the federal government.
“We won’t stop our MPKK from attending state government’s programmes. They can attend any programmes by the GPS government. We don’t subscribe to the GPS way of politicking,” he added.