18 families receive aid for building new houses in Santubong

KUCHING: A total of 18 families from the Santubong Parliamentary constituency yesterday were chosen to receive aid for the construction of new homes under the Rumah Ihsan Wan Junaidi Project (PRIWJ) this year.

Santubong MP Datuk Seri Wan Junaidi Tuanku Jaafar said the project was a personal initiative to help the needy in his constituency build new homes.

He said the project which began in 2015, has so far seen 18 families receive allocations of about RM70,000 each, for the purpose of building a new furnished home.

"The selection of all 36 recipients (including 18 chosen today) was done by my service centre's committee. Any resident in the Santubong Parliamentary constituency may apply for this assistance, provided the applicant or any family member owns a piece of land," said Wan Junaidi, who is also the Natural Resources and Environment Minister when inaugurating the PRIWJ at Kampung Panglima Seman Ulu, about 10km from here yesterday.

He said although the government provided many housing assistance schemes such as Housing for the Hardcore Poor (PPRT), People Friendly Homes (RMR) and so on, sometimes the complicated application procedures which were time-consuming made it difficult for some residents to apply for it, especially for those affected by disasters such as fire.

Wan Junaidi said the PRIWJ project also used the services of builders from local villages to generate income for locals, and avoid third parties from raking the profits," he added.