The future of a community depends on the quality of education the children get. — Bernama file photo
IN July 2018, I attended a seminar on the Millennium Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations. It was organised by a group of civil society members in Kuching. At the end of the seminar, the attendees decided to create an alliance of non-governmental organisations in Sarawak to discuss ways and means by which the UN’s strategies goals could be achieved in Sarawak.
By their own efforts alone, these goals are beyond them to solve. By talking about them, they were sending signals to the governing authorities, the federal and state governments, to adopt the UN’s strategies as close as possible to their own policies.
The 17 goals
These are: No Poverty; Zero Hunger; Good Health and Well-being; Quality Education; Gender Equality; Clean Water and Sanitation; Affordable and Clean Energy; Decent Work and Economic Growth; Industry, Innovation, and Infrastructure; Reduced Inequalities; Sustainable Cities and Communities; Responsible Consumption and Production; Climate Action; Life Below Water; Life on Land; Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions; and Partnerships for the Goals.
It was the hope of the United Nations organisation for all its member nations to implement solutions projects in terms of the above strategies within a specific time-frame (2000 to 2015). This period has been extended to 2030.
Malaysia, being a member of the United Nations, is supposed to take note, if not to adopt, many of the measures set by the UN. While Malaysia has its own methods of solving her problems and has mapped out its own plans to achieve basically most of the UN’s goals during this millennium, there would be no harm for the Malaysian planners to have a look at the UN’s format for some ideas.
The UN has set these goals by way of commemorating the 21st century, during which some improvements would be made to the livelihood of the peoples of its member nations. However, many countries, for various reasons – economic, political, and other factors – did not do well during the period of 15 years (2000 to 2015); some had not even started thinking of specific plans along the UN’s outline plans. Several countries have achieved some measure of success in some of the goals, especially those countries which did not have wars with another country or internal rebellions within their own borders, but there are many more member countries which have not seen any improvement in terms of any of the 17 goals, especially in poverty eradication or rule of law mechanism, or human rights, including women’s rights.
Undaunted by the tremendous challenges, the UN is going ahead with its moral persuasion on the truant countries to start making concrete solutions plans step by step, beginning with measures to reduce absolute poverty, hunger, and to think of quality education – three-in-one solution. These are thought to be achievable by 2030 by many countries, to a large or small extent, if the human capital and natural resources of each country are properly managed by their rulers.
Working with NGOs
It is for each country to implement action plans without delay. Partnership with the private sector in planning and implementation is vital; without the joint efforts of both sectors, there would be problems of resources, expertise, and drive.
How does Malaysia fit in with this grand design of the world body?
The organisers of the seminar in July 2018 adopted the motto ‘No One Is Left Behind’. Everybody was enthusiastic; more meetings were held, then silence.
No poverty
For two years a lot of water must have flowed under the bridge. Suddenly, in June this year, the Sarawak Dayak Iban Association (Sadia) received a letter of offer from the KL-based secretariat of the All Party Parliamentary Group Malaysia-SDG, a recent creation of the federal parliament. The APPGM-SDG wanted to implement what are called Solutions Projects in the squatter colony at Chawan Road 13 and would Sadia be prepared to manage that project. The offer was accepted and the project is ongoing.
Model worth studying
In the national Budget 2021, there is an allocation of funds for APPGM-SDG to carry on with its solutions projects in the country. I hope that more poverty-stricken areas including the squatter colonies in the state would be adopted by the APPGM-SDG for their projects next year.
Those interested in the particular programme at Chawan Road 13, let them have a glance at what are involved in its implementation.
No poverty
Sticking to the UN’s strategies, the programme involves a lot of talking to motivate the participants on how to help themselves, imbibe in them the spirit of survival, especially during this Covid-19 pandemic, and a sense of future after it. In other words, the programme is designed to empower the participating villagers to organise themselves without depending too much on the help of others. In this respect, the squatters know how to survive; see how they live among the dead.
A series of social economic training sessions have been conducted by the manager with the objective of scouting for talent and quality leadership among the squatters who will be able to sustain the project when they are left on their own in future. The objective is to give the man the fishing rod, not the fish.
Surveys of the needs and problems of the programme participants had been conducted earlier by social scientists. Information from the surveys has been used to plan and implement specific activities. For instance, in terms of health, a screening on the squatters was carried out by the Population and Family Development Board. In terms of fire risk, fire extinguishers have been provided to the squatters and training on how to operate them was carried out by the Fire and Rescue Department. A general cleaning of the compounds as part of the exercise to prevent outbreaks of dengue has been carried out successfully. Regular general cleaning of the compounds is important.
Other activities include promoting financial literacy, and participation in small scale entrepreneurship to generate some income — a crash course for the adults in the community.
Quality education
Most children in the community go to school. For them, tuition classes have been organised by a teacher, who is a squatter herself, with the help of a private tuition centre nearby. Programme includes: catchup tuition for preschool pupils, primary and secondary examination preparation.
Other items in the programme includes: caring for the environment; flood mitigation and repairs of plank walks.
All these activities are being carried by the squatters themselves on a gotong-royong basis, with as subtle supervision by the managers as possible. After all, it is their village to look after, until they are in a better position to be relocated elsewhere, some fine day. That is the bottom line as far as the managers and the sponsors, APPGM-SDG, are concerned.
The Chawan Road 13 is a pilot project. There are two other sites, one at Kampung Kudei and in YB Datuk Seri Nancy Shukri’s constituency. If successful, they will serve as models for any other poverty-stricken community to emulate, given the necessary funding. And interest in such projects.
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