LAWAS, Aug 5 — Chief Minister Datuk Patinggi Abang Johari Openg today urged the Pakatan Harapan (PH) federal government to fulfill its promise to fix dilapidated schools in Sarawak, after the state government remitted RM350 million in advance payment for its federal loans last week.
He said the over 1,000 dilapidated schools, including 415 which are in bad shape, must be fixed or replaced with new ones as soon as possible.
“How can we allow our children to continue studying in these schools? We want them to be smart in their studies,” Abang Johari said during a meet-the-people session here tonight.
He said the condition of some of the schools has had an adverse effect on students’ performances as seen in their public examination results.
The chief minister said this was reason why he initially wanted to offer an RM1 billion loan from the state if the federal government could not come up with the funds.
“Finally I told Putrajaya, ‘Why not we contra?’ We send RM350 million as first advance payment of our loans with the federal government.
“The condition is that it must be returned to the Sarawak to fix the dilapidated schools, most of which are in rural areas,” he said.
Abang Johari, who is also the state minister of finance and economic planning, said the state does not have any debts with the federal government.
“We always pay our loans on time,” he said, once again dismissing Finance Minister Lim Guan Eng’s claims that Sarawak still owed RM2.352 billion to the Federal government as of June 30 this year.
Lim recently said that the federal government would step up efforts to upgrade dilapidated schools in Sarawak provided the state government makes the first payment.
Lim had said the money would be deposited into the Consolidated Fund and then redirected to Sarawak to fix the dilapidated schools.
He also said contracts to repair the schools must be done through open tenders.
The state Public Works Department has been appointed as the implementing agency.
