KUCHING: The civil service has a role to play in finding solutions to challenges that arose with the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic and the consequent shutting of the country’s borders more than two years ago.
One of these has to do with the shortage of workers the country faces, especially in the construction sector, said Senior Minister of Works Datuk Seri Fadillah Yusof.
He said there was a need for foreign workers in this sector as it involved the 3Ds (dangerous, dirty and difficult jobs) in which locals usually don’t last long.
“All these affect the country and there has to be a solution to this issue,” he said at the Majlis Ramah Tamah Hari Raya Pra Gawai and Tautan Kasih for Congress of Unions of Employees in the Public and Civil Services (CUEPCAS) Retiree 2022 at a hotel here on Sunday (May 15).
“This is one of the challenges that we need to think about together with the civil services, as the implementing agency, on how to provide short, medium and long term solutions to these challenges that we are currently facing,” he added.
Towards this end Fadillah called on CUEPACS to play a role in returning to focus on putting the country’s interests above all else.
He said if there was no stability in the country’s politics, then any planning would be considered ineffective and no long-term solution related to the state’s interests would be resolved.
“We (the people) have learned, what happened in the peninsula at the federal level … when politics are unstable then plans to develop the country are affected.
“When people fight, change government, change leadership and so on then the focus on the development of the country and the development of the people is affected.”
In this context Fadillah, however, was happy to point out that political stability has been the hallmark of the Gabungan Parti Sarawak government in the state.
Its good track record helps the GPS government propel Sarawak towards becoming a more stable and prosperous state, he said.
Also present were CUEPACS President Datuk Adnan Mat and Sarawak CUEPACS Chairman Tuan Omar Bahrein Unin.
