open letter

From: JOCOCK

Sent: Sunday, March 23, 2008 09:14 PM
To: tai19744@streamyx.com
Subject: open letter

an open letter to yang amad berhormat Lim Guan Eng, chief minister of penang.
13th March, 2008

dear yab Lim,

on behalf of the blind in Penang, allow me to express our heartiest congratulations to you on your installation as our new chief minister. Dare we, the blind and other handicapped of penang look forward to a better life under the new state government of Penang? where are true needs would be better attended to? please understand that caring for the blind is more than making annual donations to St. Nicholas home because the bulk of the blind (99.999 per cent.) live outside St. Nicholas and receive no help from st. Nicholas. Apart from the meagre welfare allowance from the federal government which is not even sufficient to meet a quarter of their daily needs, they receive no help, no ang pows because st,. Nicholas jealously prevent blind outsiders from receiving them from the public, during the chinese new year, no donations no nothing. of any kind. allow us to present the following reasonable requests for the kind consideration of our new state government:

1. an additional welfare allowance of rm300 per month to all blind citizens born or residing in penang who live on their own and who are unemployed. this allowance together with the monthly federal allowance of rm300 will help all blind people and make it easier for them to make ends meet. as you probably are unaware, 50 years after independence, the plight of the blind have not improved one iota both in terms of employment opportunities and in terms of their welfare. the bulk of the blind today have no steady income and the majority subsist on their meagre federal allowance and for many not at all.

2. provide more employment opportunities both in the state government and in the various town councils. erect more stalls so that the blind, with the help of their families, can earn a decent living. if I'm not mistaken, under the previous state government, only a couple of blind people were employed in the mppp and none at all in the state government.

3. free assessment be given to all blind and other handicap persons to lighten their burden. after all, if the previous councils can spend millions of dollars on flowers and overseas trips, is it too much to ask this small concession?

4. free public transport to the blind in particular and handicap at large. in 1964 when the late c.y. choy was elected mayer of Penang, he waisted no time in granting free transport for the blind on the city council buses but alas this privilege was roothlessly taken away by none other than koh su Koon when his government privatised the city council busses and he didn't even care two hoots to ensure that the same privileges were carried on by the new operater. oH, dr. koh, didn't I hear you say that you were not aware? or should we blame dr. Teng Hock Nam for this? thank god these uncaring souls were booted out on March 8th. Even the Iron Lady Margret Thatcher known for her roothlessness cared enough to ensure that the blind and pentioners continued to enjoy their previous privileges when she privatised British Rail namely free travel on the underground for the blind and 50 per cent for pentioners. free public transport for the blind is an international norm and malaysia has the dubious distinction of being the only country where the blind have to pay all be it 50% on rapid Penang. it wouldn't matter so much if the employment opportunities are good here. In
Thai land and singapore and virtually the world at large, even private companies give free bus transport to the blind and ungrudgingly mind you. does this not speak volumes for malaysia being an unncaring society?

4. get the various town councils to allocate funds to
assist blind and other handicap people in the purchase of big ticket equipment which are specific to their needs such as braillers for the blind and wheel chairs for the disabled. In this connection, appoint someone in each council (Not necessarily handicap) to look into the needs of all handicap people. this is the practice in the west and penang should follow suit.

5. grant easier access to low cost housing to all handicap people even to those who are not married to help them meet the burden of ever increasing rentals.
let Penang show the way so that the other states may emulate your good example and make the blind and handicap feel that they too have a place under the malaysian sun. we have been hoping and praying for this day for a long time and may this new erra bring hope to the most marginalised of the marginalised. show that you really care and unlike the previous state government who only seem to care for the wealthy and have little time for the down troddened.
we wish you well in your new endeavours.

yours hopefully,

Joseph Soon.
tel. 04-3312413 019-4716397. e-mail ah_ba@streamyx.com