WHY SWEEPING RADIOTHERAPY CENTRE UNDERCARPET?

By : HIEW KING CHEU

THE TUMOR or Cancer (radiotherapy) centre is being constructed and situated at the Kota Kinabalu Likas Hospital. This is long over due on its scheduled completion time. There are many complaints on the late completion of the centre for use by the patients.

They are saying that this is another great failure for the government to provide the much needed health care facilities. They said why take so long to do a simple hospital building job, and is it true that the appointed contractor for the job is not capable and qualified to carry out the work there?

The work on the construction of this radiotherapy centre has been going on since 2009, and until today work is still moving on slowly. The Health Ministry has issued a warning and said that the penalty on the delay of some RM40,000 per day had been enforced.

On site, we see that the external and internal work is still going on, and it is not sure when all these can be finally completed for handing over to the Health Ministry. There are a lot of instrumentation and fitting out inside the building and these need time to be installed.

The KK MP Hiew sees that the said centre would not be able to complete on schedule, and the contractor will need more time to finish off the work. The question remains on how long the time is required for them to get the job done. At the mean while, the patients continue to wait on, and some will not even have the chance to recover. The KK MP Hiew was informed that many patients have to wait for sometime before they can get the required treatment.

The fact is what caused the long delay in the completion of the centre? Is it because of that there is not enough funding from the Health Ministry or the appointed contractor is slow in working? The Health Minister should give us a proper explanation and not by sweeping the matter under the carpet.

This is not the first time happening in Sabah, because we have seen ample examples that clinics, polyclinics, and hospitals were abandoned after a short while of starting work. The most glaring one is the QE1 twin tower block which was abandoned for some years, and the same to the Nabawan Polyclinic which didn’t get off the ground either, and now the Radiotherapy centre.

All these reflect the bad BN administration and performance, and the people is the end loser, and suffered badly because of their inefficiency and couldn’t bordered altitude towards the people in Sabah. Therefore, if we want to see a better future in Sabah, we have to change the management once for all, and have a 'New Beginning' in Sabah!  - Sabahkini