KUCHING: There are 1,453 primary and secondary schools in the state and about 70 percent of them are dilapidated, according to Minister of Welfare, Women and Community Wellbeing, Datuk Fatimah Abdulllah.
The state, she added, needed more funds to repair and rebuild dilapidated schools, especially in the rural areas.
Fatimah revealed this when officiating the handing over of a Jiwa Murni project at SK Sungai Pinang, Jalan Batu Kawa/ Bau here on Saturday.
The project involved the building of classrooms and school facilities at SK Kg. Sungai Pinang, which is one of the three schools chosen for the project under the Pacific Partnership 2017 (PP17) Exercise. The other schools are SK Plaie in Kota Samarahan and SK Binyu in Kota Padawan.
The Minister added that a total of 183 schools needed to be repaired or rebuilt urgently.
She pointed out that allocations from the federal government could not cover the total costs of repairing or rebuilding the schools.
“The state government is trying hard to resolve this issue,” Fatimah said.
She welcomed the efforts by the Malaysian Armed Force (ATM) and foreign troops to ease the burden of repairing and reconstructing some dilapidated schools in Sarawak.
Also present at the handing over of the Jiwa Murni project at SK Sungai Pinang on Saturday were Serembu State Assemblyman, Miro Simuh, Malaysian Armed Forces East Army Field Commander, Lieutenant General Datuk Mohd Zaki bin Hj Mokhtar, First Division Infantry Commander,Major General Datuk Stephen Mundaw, US Ambassador to Malaysia, Kamala Shirin Lakhdhir and State Education Director, Rakayah bin Madon.
