SIBU: The decision to issue temporary documentation to eligible stateless children to enable them access to education and health facilities is a laudable effort by the state government.
Democractic Action Party (DAP) Sarawak Political Education Bureau director Irene Chang Oi Ling said hopefully it would help reduce the number of such children being denied education and health facilities in the state.
“However, for these children to fully benefit from this latest decision without any potential confusion and hassle, the state needs to ensure that a proper mechanism is put in place to make sure that there will be full cooperation and coordination between the federal ministries and agencies and the state government.
“Since education and health are federal agencies, a lack of coordination and cooperation between them and the state government might confuse the ground staff which in turn, might cause lack of enforcement and more frustration among the parents of these children,” she pointed out in a statement yesterday.
In fact, according to her, there were many things which were within the power and ability of the state government to help all those who were caught in such predicament.
Apart from assistance for these stateless children to access education and medical facilities, she said the state government should also urgently look into ways and means to help youths 18 years and above whose applications for citizenship were still in process.
She stated that for most people, adult life starts at 18 years when they have to make the decision to either seek higher education or to look for a job and be gainfully employed.
“They have to start learning living skills in order to be equipped for the working world, including learning to drive, to apply for travel documents, to open a bank account, to eventually get married and to contribute to society.
“To most of us, these things would be taken granted. But for those without a Malaysian identification card, every door would be closed to them for them to acquire or to achieve any of the above.
“Most of these people, if lucky, would go from one menial job to another on the hand-to-mouth existence. There is also no possibility of them ever benefiting from any national and state welfare aid.
“Without any doubt, this lack of an identification card is contributing substantially to family problems and social ills as a lot of these stateless individuals battle poverty, rejection from society and social discrimination on their own,” she asserted.
To alleviate these problems faced by the stateless individuals, she suggested the state government should, in line with the stand on equal status as a founding partner in the formation of Malaysia, contemplate issuing a state pass in the form of a Sarawak card to stateless children/persons born in Sarawak.
The purpose of this card, she proposed should be to enable these stateless individuals to apply for higher studies in state-run higher learning institutions, to be gainfully employed in some work sectors and to move freely within Sarawak.
“They may even be allowed to apply for all state welfare benefits through this card so that these individuals may live their life as normal as possible as they wait for the outcome of their citizenship applications from Putrajaya, which we all know would take years.
“The state government has indeed the authority and ability to enable the stateless persons in our state to achieve a certain level of normalcy. They should have the sincerity and political will to assist these people, most of whom, are essentially born and bred Sarawakians,” Chang added.
