Resolve education issues in Tenom: MP
Published on: Saturday, April 01, 2023
Tenom Member of Parliament Riduan Rubin
Kuala Lumpur: Tenom Member of Parliament Riduan Rubin urged the Education Ministry to immediately address the school infrastructure development problems in Tenom parliamentary constituency.He said good school infrastructure is important to create a quality education ecosystem for students and help produce balanced human capital from physical, emotional, spiritual, personality and intellectual aspects.
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He said one of the problems that the Ministry needs to pay attention to is related to the application for the construction of a new school – Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan (SMK) Kuala Tomani.
According to him, the 30.62-hectare school site belonging to the Sabah Rubber Industry Board (LIGS) has been agreed and is awaiting the site and price confirmation process.
“If the price of the land does not meet the Ministry’s criteria, I will ask the Kemabong Sub-District Office to find another suitable site. The most important thing is that it is a flood-free area.
“The construction of SMK Kuala Tomani is important to resolve the congestion at SMK Kemabong and help ease the burden of those students in the area who have to travel about 15 to 30 km daily to SMK Kemabong,” he said when debating the 2023 Budget at the Education Ministry committee level in the Dewan Rakyat, here.
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Riduan also asked the Ministry to build open halls in schools in Tenom that do not yet have multi-purpose halls for student activities.
In addition, he said, the application status of eight schools in Tenom that were affected by a major flood disaster last year also needed immediate attention from the Government.
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Among them is the request to move Sekolah Kebangsaan (SK) Kalang Kanar to a new site due to the risk status of being often hit by floods because it is located near a river.
Second, the request for replacement of a dilapidated school, Sekolah Kebangsaan (SK) Ladang Sapong where this school is in too poor condition and is often hit by floods up to several times a season.
He suggested that the school be moved to an area that is safer from floods since the existing building is a wooden building.
“The wooden teacher’s room building with a height of more than five feet is often flooded and many properties were damaged including computers when the school is hit by floods,” he added.
Riduan said the others are application for the maintenance of the wooden building of Sekolah Kebangsaan (SK) Inubai which suffered a lot of damage due to floods, SK Gumisi which is no longer safe because its location is surrounded by a large river which causes large floods.
He said the application to move SK Melalap to a new site in Pekan Baharu Melalap because it had to share a site with SJKC Vun Shin and the proposed move of SK Kemabong to a new site covering an area of seven acres should also be accelerated, as well as the application for donations for the Government Aided School (SBK) to the Tenom Chinese national type schools, namely SJKC Pada, Tenom and SJKC Yuk Nam Paal, Kemabong.
He also requested the Ministry to pay attention to the application to build a new teacher’s house for SMK Entabuan and SK Sumambu.
He said SK Sumambu is a category three school that is far inland, besides being a hilly zone in the Kemabong state constituency where teachers cannot live in the area and have to commute every day using motorcycles or motocross which makes it difficult for them to teach.
Touching on the Sabah and Sarawak Rural Development Programme, Riduan urged the Ministry to resolve the water supply issue at SMK Chinta Mata and SMK Kemabong which somewhat affecting school sessions because the clean water supply was often cut off.
“I request that the existing suspension bridges in SK Melalap, SK Pangi and SK Sumambu which are used by students to go to school daily be replaced with a concrete bridge so that it is safer, quality and durable for daily use. For example the main route to SK Sumambu which one has to cross the river by car, but when flooded, even the teachers find it difficult to go through it. Likewise, the road to SK Kolorok is in very poor condition and needs to be upgraded.
“Although road and bridge projects are not under the jurisdiction of the Education Ministry, with the support of the people of Tenom, we hope the application will be prioritised by the relevant ministry,” he said.
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