Local firms encouraged to employ people with special needs
SIBU: Association for Children with Special Needs Sibu (ACSNS) chairperson Kapitan Datuk Janet Lau has appealed to local companies to employ individuals with special needs, whom she regards as ‘ blessed people in society’.
“People with special needs are also those who should be given opportunities,” she said at the launch of ‘ Sheltered Workplace and Independent Training Living Home’ project in Alan Road here yesterday.
“We would like to appeal to the people of Sibu to open your arms and embrace them ( people with special needs), to hug them, love them, care for them, and employ them if you have specific line of work for them.”
On the project, Janet said after years of ‘dreaming’ and planning, it had finally come true.
She said it would be a place where people with special needs could acquire skills to enable them to live independently. She also mentioned that the project would provide facilities to accommodate workshops, laundry, bakery, carwashing, cookery, packaging, handcrafting and mini-mart.
Janet thanked the project’s main sponsor, KTS Group managing director Dato Henry Lau and all those who had helped in one way or another.
Works on the RM13-million twostorey building would be carried out in three phases, with Phase 1 to put in place the facilities such as spaces for workshops, laundry, bakery, car-washing and handicraft training.
“The first phase will take about two years to materialise,” said Janet.
ACSNS was established in 1998, with seven children under its care. It has since registered about 10,000 individuals with special needs of whom, about 500 are going for regular assistance from the association. Datin Patinggi Dato Jamilah Anu officiated at the ceremony yesterday, on behalf of her husband Chief Minister Datuk Patinggi Tan Sri Adenan Satem.
The event was also attended by LocalGovernmentandCommunity Development Minister Dato Sri Wong Soon Koh and the function’s organising chairman Dr Toh Teck Hock.