Premier: Sarawak to align state civil servants salary to ‘be on par, if not a bit better’ than federal

KUCHING (Aug 16): The salary increment for Sarawak government servants will be aligned with federal civil servants following the announcement by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim today.

Sarawak Premier Datuk Patinggi Tan Sri Abang Johari Tun Openg said although the federal government’s salary adjustment was just announced today and to be implemented in two phases, he said the state government would need to study its quantum first.

“As I’ve said, we are studying the salary (adjustment) and we’ll calculate based on the announcement by the Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim.

“At least it would be on par, if not a bit better.

“But we need to look at our own capabilities too. The moment the salaries increase, then we expect you to deliver better (services),” he said.

He was speaking to the media at a press conference after presenting medals for the Sukma XXI taekwondo event at the Indoor Stadium here today.

Abang Johari also said new state civil servants would be recruited under the Contribution-Based-Position (JBC) scheme starting this year, which meant they would be contributing to the Employees Provident Fund (EPF) retirement scheme.

Anwar earlier today announced that civil servants across all grades would have their salaries increased under the new pay structure that will be phased in starting this December.

The first phase of the increment will be 8 per cent for those in the lower and middle grades, and 4 per cent for the upper management.

The second phase of the scheme will take effect January 2026 and will see the two groups receive another 7 per cent and 3 per cent increase, respectively.

The new salary rates are part of Anwar’s reform of the entire civil service remuneration system.

The revamped Public Service Remuneration System will replace the former scheme that Anwar said would stress on performance-based incentives.