KUCHING: Works Minister Baru Bian has been told to work harder at getting allocations to maintain federal roads in the state.
Petra Jaya MP Datuk Seri Fadillah Yusof said it was not right for Baru to ask the state government to bear the cost of maintaining these federal roads for obvious reason – federal roads should be the responsibility of the federal government.
Fadillah who was former works minister in the previous federal government said: “Baru Bian should strive to get the allocation from the Minister of Finance, as I did before when I was in the same position.
“Every time the allocation was insufficient for road maintenance, as the minister responsible, I always applied for the allocation to be added and never asked the state to bear the costs,” he said in a media statement yesterday.
Fadillah said federal provisions to Sarawak had been cut yet Baru was now asking the state to bear the cost of maintaining federal roads.
“This should not be. As a minister from Sarawak, Baru should fight for the interests of Sarawak, and not play to his Malayan masters.”
At a press conference in Penang Thursday, Baru announced that the Putrajaya might ask the state government to bear the cost of building and maintaining federal and village roads using its own funds this year.
