TUARAN, Sept 16 — Education officers at the state and district levels in Sabah are asked to prioritise the issues related to the infrastructure and facilities at schools that need immediate attention, said Senior Minister of Education Radzi Jidin.

He said there were various issues related to schools in Sabah that had been going on for a long time, including dilapidated buildings.

According to him, each school has a unique issue that requires the representatives of the ministry to go down to the ground to listen to the grouses in the effort to find a solution.

"(Therefore) I urge all officers at PPD (District Education Offices) and JPN (State Education Department) to set priorities and arrange the critical issues,” he said when meeting teachers and officers from the Tuaran PPD here today.

Commenting further, Radzi said to solve the problem of dilapidated schools, the ministry in collaboration with the Public Works Department (JKR) had introduced a building category system to assess the condition of school infrastructure.

"We have categorised the buildings (into several categories) and those in category seven are technically unsafe schools, (if there are schools in this category) we need to give priority.

"There are also school buildings that can still be repaired and we will channel the maintenance allocation,” he said.

Meanwhile, Radzi said the ministry was serious in improving the quality of education in the country and he was confident that the "go down to the ground” approach could help in understanding issues related to education better. — Bernama