THERE ARE MANY SABAHANS STILL LIVING ON SUBSISTENCE INCOME OR "KAIS PAGI MAKAN PAGI, KAIS PETANG MAKAN PETANG,"

30pc Sabahans under new poverty index: Harris

Tawau: Former Chief Minister Datuk Harris Salleh said Sabah still lags behind other states in Malaysia after 50 years of independence through the formation of Malaysia.

He estimated that at least 30 per cent of Sabahans are under the new poverty index.

There are many Sabahans still living on subsistence income or "kais pagi makan pagi, kais petang makan petang," he said.

"With the cost and standards of living escalating and with the income of the people in rural and urban areas only increasing slightly, the effect means that people will just continue to be poorer and poorer under the new index of poverty," he said.

He also lamented that the Federal Government has classified people in Kuala Lumpur earning RM1,700 as poor.

Speaking to 18 members of the Ex-Assemblymen Association during their visit to Balung here, Saturday, he said these days money is everything and is required for everything.

Although the rural houses may have been rebuilt or improved by the Government, at least 15 per cent of these houses have hardly any cash even as low as RM10 at any one time, he said.

"Vegetables or fruits are hardly being planted around their house compound. These outside incomes may be from the government contracts or either their children working in Peninsular Malaysia," he said.

"It appears that the government policies and programmes are not conductive nor productive in helping these rural people. With the desires on living the modern lifestyle, these rural people had to sell off their lands or lease them all at once for 99 years.

"The government stimulus packages and the subsistence on various consumer goods, that includes the giving of allowance to the hardcore poor and fishermen. All these do not contribute much to the rural economy.

The stimulus packages are nothing but only benefits the 'negotiated contractors' and foreign workers.

"Development of infrastructures like schools and medical facilities does not contribute directly to the income of the rural people," he said.

With respect to the tourists, Sabah is only getting mostly the budget tourists but despite this fact, everyone is praising Sabah as a great tourist product, he said.

"I, on my part, have left many economic activities for Sabah and Sabahans.

For example, the famous 906,330 acres identified and reserved for the smallholders and the planting of accacia trees. Accacia wood will be the wood of Sabah for now and the future," he said.

He was also critical of the ex-assemblymen, asking them if they had achieved anything to change Sabah and Sabahans, particularly the livelihoods of the people during their respective terms.

"The answer is categorically, no," he said.