Opposition reps had to pay for food supply first before claiming reimbursement during pandemic, Kuching High Court told

KUCHING (July 30): The High Court here today was told that the Opposition assemblymen had to pay for food items upfront and then seek reimbursement from the RM200,000 allocated per constituency during the Covid-19 pandemic.

In the suit filed by Deputy Premier Datuk Amar Dr Sim Kui Hian against Democratic Action Party (DAP) Sarawak chairman Chong Chieng Jen, the former’s counsel Shankar Ram Asnani argued that Chong’s allegations of a discriminatory policy in the official memorandum by Ministry of Women, Childhood, and Community Wellbeing Development Sarawak were untrue.

The official memorandum stated that the Food Supply Chain Committee had allocated RM200,000 for each state constituency, solely for the purchase of food, which would be supplied to the target groups in the respective constituencies.

Chong disagreed, stating that the Resident’s Office had informed him that the ADUNs’ (elected representatives) from the Opposition were required to pay for food items upfront and then seek reimbursement from the RM200,000 allocation, rather than purchasing the food directly.

Chong added that the Opposition ADUNs were also not entitled to direct the Divisional Disaster Management Committee (DDMC) to pay for food aid purchased by them (Opposition ADUNs) from the suppliers.

“The extent of the discrimination in the Kuching area, in particular Padungan, Pending, Batu Lintang and Kota Sentosa constituencies, was even more shameful and serious in the sense that Batu Kawa Service Centre was granted RM1 million in allocated fund, yet the ADUN was quarantined from April 3, 2020, for about a week and that we did not see any activity of food aid distribution by the service centre for the first two weeks of April.

“And up to the end of April, there was no sign of the Batu Kawa Service Centre of the plaintiff and his team distributing food items in the areas of Padungan, Pending, Batu Lintang and Kota Sentosa.

“For us DAP, who wanted to help the needy families by distributing foods to their houses, we were deprived of the rights to use the RM200,000 food aid allocation per constituency, but the right to use the allocation was granted to someone who did not want to carry out his duty,” testified Chong, the assemblyman for Padungan.

In 2020, Dr Sim – Batu Kawah assemblyman and also Sarawak United People’s Party (SUPP) president – filed a suit over Chong’s allegation that the Deputy Premier had failed to manage food aid funds worth RM800,000 meant for four Opposition-held state constituencies: Padungan, Batu Lintang, Pending and Kota Sentosa.

Chong was represented by counsels Michael Kong, Chong Siew Chiang, Brenda Chong and Sharon Lo.

Apart from Shankar, Dr Sim was also represented by Lai Eddy.

The suit was heard before Judge Dr Alwi Abdul Wahab.