ALLOWANCE RM650 FOR SABAH VILLAGE CHIEFS IS NOT FAIR?

IN SABAH, the Ketua Kampong (village chief) felt unhappy to the ruling of being given the RM650 monthly allowance. According to them it is unfair for the government to announce the increment of their allowances from the original RM450 to a mere RM650, and only starts in November 2011.

The Sabah Minister of Local Government and Housing, Datuk Hajiji Noor disclosed today that by saying the scenario in Sabah is different from that of the Peninsular Malaysia and the job nature varies, therefore the Sabah Village chiefs received less allowances by RM200.

With the new allowance, Sabah village chiefs get RM650, with RM600 coming from the Federal and RM50 from the state government. The same RM200 increment goes to the JKKK chairman too.

The Sabah DAP Kapayan Branch Chief, Stephen Jimbangan said it is unfair to the Ketua Kampongs and JKKK chief to receive RM200 less then the Semananjong counterparts. In fact they should entitle to the same amount like them and those in Sarawak.

He couldn’t understand the logic behind this, because in Sabah the Ketua kampongs and JKKK chiefs here are working in areas where there are many difficulties and problems in respect to transportation, communication, administrative work and localized problems.

They have to spend much more money to fulfill their job responsibilities and to serve the people effectively. Many of them actually cannot make ends meet and have to find the need money to top up.

The government on one hand wanted to make use of them to be their eyes and ears, but is not paying them the right amount on the expenses. The worst is that why pay them only starting from November 2011 and not back dated to January this year to encourage them to work harder for the people.

Hajiji is actually wrong, because the state government is supposed to pay the Ketua Kampongs and JKKK chiefs on the news allowances of RM600, and the RM50 is actually from the Federal. He actually had got it wrong. What about the Kapitan Cina, do they get the same increment?

We want the State government to follow the same as the Semananjong and Sarawak to pay our Ketua Kampongs, Kapitan Cina and JKKK the same RM800 and starting from the original date of 1st January 2011 as announced and promised by the Prime Minister Datu Seri Najib Tun Razak cum Minister of Finance.

This seems like a joke, and Sabah BN is going against the instruction given by their boss in KL. This is contradicting to the directive issued and is it true that the instruction can be played around.

It is a shame that our Ketua Kampongs, JKKKs, and Kapitan Cina are not well taken care off.

- Sabahkini