SHAH ALAM, 11 July: Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s visit to the capital last night was merely to seek publicity to save the image of Barisan Nasional (BN) which was spoiled by his cabinet minister.
The Member of Parliament for Segambut, Lim Lip Eng, said that the top leader’s visit, while looking at the operations of soup kitchens and the distribution of food to the homeless, is deemed somewhat late, and in fact, it does not bring about any benefit to the group.
He said that the fate of the urban poor has not changed even though the Prime Minister has personally visited these people.
“I was surprised to see the Prime Minister just visiting the homeless on the sidewalks and then just leaving them there without doing anything. How can the poor be left to continue sleeping on sidewalks after the Prime Minister’s visit?
“This clearly shows that he has not done anything in the past five years and he personally does not know what to do now,” he said in a statement.
Lip Eng said that he and several friends had previously distributed dry food to the homeless in Kuala Lumpur to dismiss Najib’s claims that the capital supposedly no longer has hard-core poor people.
He said that Prime Minister and his party did not help much to ease the burden shouldered by the less fortunate, and instead, merely made announcements and empty promises.
“After this visit, will Najib devise the best solution to address the problems of the homeless and the urban poor, or is the proposal to ‘transport’ beggars and impose a fine on those donating to this people, the best plan he can think of?
“The Prime Minister’s visit is at level with the only goal scored by Brazil during the World Cup semi-finals against Germany after being humiliated by seven goals,” he said.
Yesterday, Najib reportedly arrived at 10.40pm and spent about an hour watching the distribution of food and drinks by volunteers and walked around the Cahaya Suria building in the capital.
Najib, who was accompanied by the Minister of Federal Territories, Datuk Seri Tengku Adnan Tengku Mansor, and the Minister for Women Development, Datuk Seri Rohani Abdul Karim, greeted the homeless who were sleeping at the roadsides.
The issue of the homeless people in the city became a hot topic when Tengku Adnan vowed to clean-up Kuala Lumpur from beggars and the homeless, especially within a 2 kilometre radius of Lot 10 in Bukit Bintang.
For this purpose, it was announced that people who give money to beggars and volunteers of soup kitchens will also be fined if they continue to help this group.
Adnan allowed soup kitchens to operate until August 16; after the Aidilfitri celebration.
NS
