Friday, November 20, 2009

Reaching out to the poor

What say you on the issue below?

SCORES of people in the Cheras district thronged the MCA service centre in Balakong recently when they heard about the Social Welfare Department’s project to identify those in need of welfare assistance.

Dubbed Projek Cari, it is an outreach programme to collect comprehensive data on all those in need of government aid. The data collected would be forwarded to the relevant agencies for further action.

Former Balakong assemblyman Datuk Hoh Hee Lee, who was at the service centre to supervise the project, said the exercise was a one-stop programme to help the poor in the area.

Several data collection officers from the Social Welfare Department were present to take down the particulars of those in need of help.

“Targeted at the poor, the project is also aimed at single mothers as well as disabled people.

“The programme will not only help these target groups financially but also in other aspects,’’ said Hoh.

He said the project would also require the cooperation from various parties, including district heads to identify the hardcore poor so that they would not have to go through the process of moving from one agency to another.

Hoh said although the agencies had a compilation list from the previous years, the one-day programme also registered new applicants.

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