Dilapidated schools in Sarawak will get the necessary funds to do repair works as well as make significant upgrades.
The federal government allocated RM100 mln this year to repair or upgrade 32 schools, and work is expected to begin in July, says Education, Science and Technology Research Minister Datuk Seri Michael Manyin Jawong.
The management of these projects are directly under the Ministry of Education, with Sarawak JKR as the implementing agency,” he said in his winding-up speech at the State Legislative Assembly, adding that work should be completed by year end.
Manyin explained that the Sarawak government was able to impress upon the federal government for special allocation to address the issue.
It was agreed by the previous administration to allocate RM1 bln, which was supposed to be over and above the annual allocation under the 11th Malaysia Plan.
“RM500 mln was to be spent in 2018, and another RM500 mln in 2019 while the RM416 mln that was allocated in 2018 to repair and upgrade 116 schools was not part of the RM1 bln allocated under the 2018 budget.
“(Work on) Fifty out of 116 schools were done by Sarawak JKR and all have been completed. The remaining 66 schools implemented by MOE, 22 schools are still under construction (offer date: between February and March 2018; completion date — 18th July 2018 latest),” he said.
He added that the two major issues faced by Sarawak were dilapidated schools and low enrolment schools.
According to the Sarawak Education Department, 1,020 out of 1,457 schools in Sarawak have been identified as dilapidated schools in 2017.
These are divided into three categories i.e., DS1, DS2 and DS3 (DS1 – 25% dilapidated; DS2 – 50% dilapidated; DS3 – 75% dilapidated).
“Since 2017, a lot of effort has been made to upgrade our dilapidated schools by both the federal and state governments.
“The federal government projects include those in the 11th Malaysia Plan and additional allocation for the IBS projects in 2016 to 2018. Under the 11th Malaysia Plan, 18 schools are being rebuilt while 166 schools are being upgraded in which 144 have been completed under the IBS project. As mentioned earlier, another 32 schools will be upgraded this year using the RM100 mln,” he said.
Manyin also added that Sarawak had implemented its own projects to improve the schools — through the Special Development Allocation Fund (SDAF), Sarawak allocated at least RM37 mln to assist government-aided schools to improve their facilities.
And under the Rural Transformation Initiatives (RTI), RM21 mln was allocated to 63 schools identified for repair and upgrading works over the period of 2018 to 2020 – work on 26 schools have already been completed.
“Sarawak is also funding the relocation of SK Ulu Segan, Bintulu, and SK Maludam, Betong as both are currently under construction and expected to be ready by 2021.
“Twenty-eight companies have participated in the open tender for the construction of SK Ulu Segan and SK Maludam whereby Town Builder Realty Sdn Bhd submitted a bid of RM29.5 mln for SK Ulu Segan while Tokoh Bina Sdn Bhd submitted a bid of RM35.8 mln for SK Maludam,” he said.
Apart from that, Sarawak also allocated RM160 mln for the upgrading of schools in the Northern Region Development Agency (NRDA) area.
RM6.2 mln was given to connect at least 33 rural schools to treated water supply under the 11th Malaysia Plan, expected to be completed by the end of this year.
“RM50 mln was allocated to connect at least 113 rural schools to the electricity grid but they cannot proceed until consent is received from the MOE.
“Additionally, the state has also provided RM4 mln to 50 schools affected by floods in 2018 to replace damaged ICT and non-ICT equipment, facilities and furniture,” he said.
He further noted that the Sarawak Education Department was currently reviewing the total number of dilapidated schools throughout the state after the various upgrading projects in which the verification workshop on dilapidated schools was carried out in March and they had yet to receive the final report.
Manyin stated that Low Enrolment Schools (LES) are defined as a school that has less than 150 students and in Sarawak, 651 out of 1,265 primary schools have been identified as LES by the Education Planning and Research Division of MOE.
“Sarawak in collaboration with the federal government hoped to merge some of these low enrolment schools into centralised schools to ensure optimisation of resources and facilities.
“According to initial estimation, 357 of the current LES can be merged into 126 centralised schools as long as the criteria for merging of schools include consent from the parents, site availability, road accessibility, boarding facilities and access to public utilities – i.e. water and electricity supply,” he said.
Manyin said the merging of schools would involve a substantial amount of funding, which they hoped the federal government would consider favourably because it would reduce operation costs in the long run.
