MIC gives 5-star rating to new Labuan market
Published on: Tuesday, November 04, 2014
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LABUAN: Despite some adverse comments about the new Public Market, MIC here has given it thumbs-up, saying it is one of the best in Borneo although there are no Indian stalls selling popular Indian cuisine such as thosai, iddli, murkuh and chapati."Though being new in the job, Member of Parliament Datuk Rozman Isli successfully got the facility completed as it encountered delay," said Chairman Ramasamy Rengasamy.In 2009, the market was declared a "sick" project when the contractor could not handle the escalating costs and handed it back to Labuan Corporation. The original cost was RM24.88 million and the re-tendered price was RM33.5 million. It is understood that the LC had initiated action to recover the lost amount.
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Speaking on the plus points of the market, Ramasamy said: "I have been around to Tawau, Sandakan, Kota Belud, Kudat and other towns and could say without hesitation that we have the best market now…spacious, clean and ample parking bays for 200 vehicles. The rental charged by LC is also reasonable based on the Labuan rates. The rates vary between RM25 and RM400 per month which is less than RM1 per day for the ground floor and about RM13 for the upper bazaar and food court floors.Speaking on the minus points, Ramasamy said that it would have been better if the new market had been designed for more stalls to cater for the future demand and not just absorb the present number of vendors at the old market. He said if a bigger market had been built today, not many would be left out from getting a stall or space at the market. This he said was the fault of the earlier planners.
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On the food court, Ramasamy said MIC was dissatisfied because despite having only two applicants for stalls at the court which has 13 stalls, none of the applicants were successful. He noted that one of the applicants had served the forces for 22 years and being an ex-serviceman, some consideration should have been given to his background.
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He said it was the government policy to provide opportunities to those who had sacrificed their best part of life to serve the nation.Ramasamy noted that it was important that the food court offered a diverse cuisine as Malaysian was famed as the "melting point" of Asia with every type of food available to cater to the gastronomical delights of a plural society."A larger variety of choice would also draw more people to the food court," added Ramasamy.Presently, the court is predominated with almost similar fare such as nasi campur, gado-gado, nasi ayam, soto, economy rice. Small wonder that during a random check last Friday, there was only a handful of patrons.MIC is not the only party which had complained about the allocation of stalls. Recently, Upko chairman here Ronald James also expressed disappointment when a dressmaker from the KDM community failed to get a stall. Ronald felt that the KDMs were sidelined.Stay up-to-date by following Daily Express’s Telegram channel.
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