KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 31 — Yayasan Chow Kit (YCK) has clarified that Putrajaya did not stop funding its KL Krash Pad centre that assists street children amid a brouhaha over government aid cuts from activist groups in Chow Kit.

YCK founder Dr Hartini Zainudin said Women, Family and Community Development Ministry officials informed her in a meeting yesterday that the non-governmental organisation (NGO) based in a squalid area of the city centre instead was requested to submit another proposal for four months’ funding.

“They said our funding has not been cut off because we didn’t receive an official letter,” Hartini told Malay Mail Online.

“We have to submit another proposal and if it’s approved, it will only be for four months. They’ll review funding every four months. It’s good news,” she added.

Hartini said the ministry had told the NGO to request for less than RM300,000 and that YCK has yet to decide on how much funding to ask for.

The child rights activist said earlier this month that the Women, Family and Community Development Ministry headed by Datuk Rohani Abdul Karim had decided not to continue with its annual RM300,000 funding to KL Krash Pad next year.

Seed, however, has yet to hear from the ministry after it wrote a letter on December 4 saying that it has decided not to continue funding the NGO’s Pusat Bantuan Khidmat Sosial (PBKS) — which provides services to transgenders, sex workers and people living with HIV in Chow Kit — next year.

YCK founder Dr Hartini Zainudin said earlier this month that the Women, Family and Community Development Ministry headed by Datuk Rohani Abdul Karim (pic) had decided not to continue with its annual RM300,000 funding to KL Krash Pad next year. — Picture by Choo Choy May
YCK founder Dr Hartini Zainudin said earlier this month that the Women, Family and Community Development Ministry headed by Datuk Rohani Abdul Karim (pic) had decided not to continue with its annual RM300,000 funding to KL Krash Pad next year. — Picture by Choo Choy May

“MAC verbally said will help us for the first month. Nothing from the ministry yet. At least with MAC’s help, it gives us time to source out for another place too,” Seed acting executive Mitch Yusmar Yusof told Malay Mail Online yesterday, referring to the Malaysian AIDS Council.

The Women, Family and Community Development Ministry has been giving RM700,000 annually for the past seven years to PBKS, which was started by then minister Datuk Seri Shahrizat Abdul Jalil in 2007.

Shahrizat said last Wednesday that she would plead with her successor Rohani to continue funding PBKS and KL Krash Pad.