Licence for sand dredging
We all know the construction industry needs sand for many purposes. I wonder why our BN government is not willing to issue licences for sand dredging. I have read about an operator in Sibu who wanted to renew his licence but he was rejected. I am not very sure about the exact reason(s) for his failure to get his licence renewed.
But I know Taib Mahmud and his cronies are in control of almost everything in Sarawak for themselves. It is the government “by, for of” Taib Mahmud and his cronies at the expense of Sarawakians. It is an open secret that every licence of big operations issued required ‘a big sum of under-table $’. I don’t know why Taib Mahmud and his cronies are not investigated at all by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) at all.
By the words of mouth, I heard that Taib Mahmud and his family and his cronies have a cement manufacturing factory which requires a constant feeding of good sand. Jabu and his family have the company sole right for dredging sand at will. I hope they will prove to us that all these rumours are not true. From here, I infer that it is the conflict of interest between these political thugs and the people. This is the real cause of problems when these political thugs abuse their power in collusion and when everything is “Me first!” This is what has been happening since time immemorial in Sarawak.
It is not surprising that We Sibu / Sarawak often face cement shortage for the good reason that Taib Mahmud’s cement manufacturing company enjoy the monopoly of cement manufacturing for export and to hike the price at will locally. This practice of Win-Loss has been going on since time immemorial. That is why we all believe that Taib Mahmud has US80+ billion in his possession. I have read an article that his eldest son who has just divorced with his first wife owns 17 expensive cars, 1000+ acres / hectares of land in Sarawak,………… alamak!!!! I don’t know whether Sarawakians are as shocked by this news as many were shocked to know that Ferdinand Marcos’ wife owned 300 expensive shoes and a lot of jewellery at the expense of Filipinos about 20s years ago.
We have such a long river like the Rejang River and it is heavily silted at many places and I see it no reason why the applicants are rejected for renewal or new licences to do the dredging. I just cannot understand why the construction industry faces the problem of cement shortage all the time. I always attribute the problem to corruption and collusion to create the shortage to hike the price for their own benefits.
It is not hard for me to understand why the political thugs like Tengah Ali, James Masing, ……. are ever ready to pound on those who criticise Taib Mahmud. He gives me the impression that he not only controls all the resources in Sarawak but also controls every of his subordinates. He is just like Czar in old Russia. He is like an emperor in old China.
We are not only facing the shortage of sand, we are also facing the shortage of timber for our local furniture manufacturing factories despite the fact that Sarawak is bestowed with the timber in abundance. Now we Sarawakians face the curse of Taib Mahmud and his cronies to face these problems. The real cause of the problem is corruption and collusion in different transaction all to their advantages and their self-interest.
We should rally as many Sarawakians as possible to flush them out as soon as possible either through voting or …………….
Labahua. 9/6/2011
