FRIDAY-4 APRIL 2008-MAYOR EXPLAINS, APOLOGIZES TO MP HIEW

Mayor explains, apologizes to MP Hiew

KOTA KINABALU:

Mayor Datuk Iliyas Ibrahim has called on Member of Parliament for Kota Kinabalu, Dr Hiew King Cheu not to politicize the issue of him not being included in the City Hali meeting on Tuesday. The invitation letter to Hiew was sent by an officer in the Sub Urban Department who was not aware of the directives in the National Action Council (NAC) dated 15 November2004 issued by the Prime Minister, he said. Saying that he has personally apologized and explained the unintentional mistake to Hiew, Iliyas denied there were “instructions from the higher authority’ to disallow the Member of Parliament to attend the said meeting, and the City Hall was only following the directive in the NAC. He also clarified that the meeting was actually the District Action Committee meeting and not the City Hall’s Advisory Council meeting as stated by Hiew. According to Iliyas, the NAC states that only the elected Assemblymen and Members of Parliament of the ruling Government are allowed to sit in all the District Action Committee meeting throughout the country. He said City Hall’s Director of Sub Urban, Azimi Salim, who organized the meeting has also written an apology letter to Hiew, who accepted their apologies. “He has accepted our apologies and I do not know why he decided to go to the press and politicize the matter,” said Iliyas, who added that both City Hall and Hiew, the elected MP for Kota Kinabalu, has the same role, that is serving the people. Hence, both parties should forgive and tolerate one another and not make a big issue out of a small matter that was not done intentionally, he said. According to Azmi, after explaining to Hiew the mistake on the invitation letter and pointing out the NAC directives, the latter was actually offered to stay on as an observer in the meeting but he (Hiew) said it was okay and decided to leave. On the meeting that was chaired by City Hall Director General, Datuk Dr Chua Kim Hing and attended by other elected Assemblymen and Members of Parliament from the Barisan Nasional parties, Iliyas said all those present are also representatives of the people of Kota Kinabalu. On calls for transparency, he said the City Hall, being a Government agency is committed to serve the people and has always practised transparency in all its dealings.

FRIDAY-4 APRIL 2008-CALL FOR OPEN TENDERS

Call for open tenders

Sabah builders call for transparency in awarding of Government projects

KOTA KINABALU:

Sabah Builders Association (SBA) has called on the Federal and State Governments to be transparent when opening tenders for their various projects. Apart from helping to reduce the cost of the projects, an open tender system would prevent malpractices and ensure projects are awarded fairly and completed on or before schedule, said SBA President Tsen Kui Lin in a statement yesterday. He said this was among the main issues discussed during the recent SBA annual general meeting, when a lot of members voiced out their dissatisfaction over the present system in awarding Government projects. He said some of the members pointed out that they would only know of the existence of various Government projects after being implemented. Tsen said most of the contractors in the State, articu1arIy SBA members, have been deprived of the chance to participate in the implemental con of Government projects. He said the SBA meeting also resolved to persist in their call for the authorities concerned to reduce the levy on construction workers and abolish PKK and Pukonsa licenses, maintaining only CIDB as the other two are overlapping. The Association wants the Government to let local contractors to secure contracts for projects directly without going to sub—con and sub—sub—con, as it would reduce the cost of the projects, he said. It hopes efforts to revive the SabaContractors Consortium as a construction arm would proceed for the benefits and future of SBA members, he said, adding that more local workers should be trained through the setting up of the proposed Sabah Consortium College. Tsen said SBA is planning to either buy or build a new office building as the existing one is old and obsolete. They are also planning to establish a website for SBA to communicate with members and other trade associations.