AFTER a whirlwind tour of various longhouse communities outside Kuching last week, Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak came back to Sarawak on Tuesday to open the Parti Pesaka Bumiputra Bersatu (PBB) 12th triennial assembly in the state capital.
However, his earlier visit is still fresh in the minds of longhouse residents in Roban, Kabong, Krian and Ulu Awik, who caught glimpses of the PM when he called on a few homes and launched several rural electification projects.
While politicians preparing for the next state polls are happy, some residents have not been so enthusiastic as Najib had by-passed the longhouses which, they feel, really matter.
"Next time, those arranging the visit should include in the PM's iterinary trips to poor longhouses," an elderly resident told Malaysian Mirror.
"It is good that he wants to make frequent trips to Sarawak. But if he is taken only to those well-furnished longhouses he would think that all is well and everyone is comfortable under the leadership of Chief Minister Abdul Taib Mahmud," he added.
Electricity to the rural homes
Najib's visit on Feb 24 and Feb 25 had taken him to longhouses in Sri Aman, Saratok and Kanowit as well as the riverine bazaar of Simunjan, in keeping with his pledge to make frequent visits to Sarawak.
During the two days he was here, he launched a rural electrification project at an Iban longhouse, Rumah Juliana, in Kamidan Jaya, Ulu Awit in Saratok, which is about two hours from Sarikei.
While there, he promised that more longhouses will get electricity and clean water this year.
Most of the people in Rumah Juliana are civil servants and well-off farmers, not contract workers or timber workers, who live in shabby longhouses.
Najib also called at Rumah Radin, another Iban longhouse, in Lachau Ulu, Sri Aman, where he officiated at another rural electrification project.
At Simunjan, he was briefed on a flood mitigation project in Kampung Nanas and Kalaka.
The PM also met residents at Iban settlement schemes in Nanga Tada in Kanowit, about 90 minutes drive from Sibu.
It is to his credit that Najib had kept to his pledge of visiting Sarawak, following his first trip to the state this year for the Chinese New Year event.
But the state's people would love to see him going into the nooks and cranies of the interior places in Saratok, for instance.
After 47 years, we get this?
Sungkey Gima, 75, lamented that after 47 years of being an independent state in Malaysia, it is shocking that it was only now that some longhouses are getting electricity and water.
"Apparently there are many more - hundreds more - still without such basic amenities.
“Doesn’t the PM see that if we are already so well-off and progressing, there would be no more longhouses without electricity and water? I am wondering what had gone wrong," he said.
"I don't know about Sabah but while the rest of Malaysia is progressing we, in Sarawak, are not moving forward. As a Sarawakian, I feel sidelined," added Sungkey, from Rumah Ambas, Kedoh Roban.
He said the Rumah Ambas longhouse received electricity supply in 1994 but the residents build their own 'dam' at the ulu sungai (upstream) and their own piping for their water supply.
Since some of them work as construction workers they also build their own longhouses.
“ It’s not as beautiful or comfortable as the long houses that Najib visited, but it’s livable,” quipped Sungkey.
They also build their own roads and bridges but in 2008, before the March general election, the government moved in to give them tarred roads and a better bridge.
“ We hope the government will continue to provide us with better infrastructure, just like what is continuously given in the semenanjung (the peninsular) and not only when there is an election."
The young and able-bodied men have gone
Sungkey is grateful, however, that the Rumah Ambas longhouse is "not as bad' as some other longhouse communities, where many young people had left their old ones, women and children to seek greener pasteurs in Kuching, Sibu and even in peninsular Malaysia.
“ Since there are no more able-bodied men living in the longhouse, those who are left behind continue to live in a pathetic state.
"It is ony when the men come back that the long houses will be mended and this could take years.
"The state government should look into this matter. After all, are they not the people of Sarawak?”
His son, Machup Sungkey, 42 , is also frustrated with those who organise Najib's trip to Sarawak. "They should take the PM to see other long houses, to show him the actual situation.
"Maybe, they are afraid that the PM will take action against them if he finds that the elected Sarawakians had not carried out their job well," he said. — Malaysian Mirror
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