NORIAH AHMAD

SIBU: Sarawak could soon see the addition of up to five more community-based rehabilitation (CBR) centres throughout the state to help meet the high demand for social welfare services, if its request to the federal government is approved.

This would bring the number of CBR centers in the state to 41, including the eight centres added last year.

State Welfare director Noriah Ahmad disclosed this during her presentation to participants on the last day of the 4th National Early Childhood Intervention Conference (NECIC) here yesterday.

Noriah praised the Agape Center in Sibu with its integration of local health department and NGO services for special needs children and adults as “one of the best model” which the state plans to emulate in future development.

She also encouraged more community welfare services centres who were eligible to come forward to register with the government so that they could have better access to government funds and sponsorship.

The latest statistics show that the number of individuals with special needs (ISN) in the state registered with the department continues to rise significantly.

So far as of the period of January to June this year, 27,919 ISN have registered with the department, up 14.8 per cent from 24,310 individuals registered for the whole of last year.

In 2007, the number of ISNs registered was just 13, 763.

Noriah urged all ISNs to register themselves with the department regardless of whether they required welfare assistance or not so that the department’s database would reflect the situation on the ground more accurately.

The state Welfare director also disclosed that as of April this year, the state has spent RM7.8 million for all its 33 CBR centres.

From this figure, RM2.152 million was spent on allowances for the disabled (OKU); RM2.187 million for care aid and chronic patients (Pesakit Kronik Terlantar) services; RM1.606 million on allowances for unemployed disabled and RM124k for devices and aids.

Meanwhile, when met later by theSundaypost, Noriah revealed that the Welfare Department had sponsored about 40 of their CBR staff from throughout Sarawak to attend this year’s NECIC conference because they saw it as an investment in the skills, knowledge and career of their personnel.

“It is good for them to come and learn from local and overseas experts as well as network with others in the same field. Since the conference was held locally, we saw this as a golden opportunity to send as many as we could so they could benefit,” she explained.

She also shared that the Welfare Department was continually looking into ways to improve the quality and delivery of its services, including using SMS and information on their website to inform applicants of the status of their applications for welfare.

She also disclosed that the waiting time for local applicants for the OKU card in the state will be cut down drastically with the recent arrival of the machine to make the cards. Previously, locals were subjected to long waits and delays as the cards had to be sent to West Malaysia to be made.

The machine is expected to be fully operational later this month once staff complete the training programme.