Most Read
Most Commented
mk-logo
News
Time to declare national emergency on child poverty in KL

MP SPEAKS | The city is glitzy and rich with high-end shopping malls, pubs, coffee bars and various restaurants serving up mouth-watering cuisine from different parts of the world. 

But ironically, a recent Unicef survey says children who live in poor low-cost flats in the same city of Kuala Lumpur are not eating sufficiently enough causing stunted growth. 

Precisely put, 15 percent of children below the age of five are underweight while 22 percent of children are stunted, almost two times higher compared with the KL average.  

The conditions in these low-cost high-rise People's Housing Projects (PPRs) are appalling –  cramped spaces, urine infested stairways, poor lighting, lack of garbage disposal areas, heavy littering and lack of public safety mechanisms. 

But it remains a lifeline to many who earn less than RM3,000 in Malaysia. 

So it’s no surprise that the report also says that many children from these housing areas don’t even go to school, as their parents are the urban poor who simply cannot afford it. 

'The other Malaysia'

In recent years, urban poverty in Malaysia has been considered as an increasingly visible phenomenon due to the impact of urbanisation. 

Urban poor families are finding it harder to cope, and the rising cost of living has had a severe impact on their spending power. 

Forced to make ends meet, they end up living in these low-cost flats where many still cannot pay their rent or maintenance fees. 

Poverty, inequality and years of low wages have come to debilitate the very young.

This is a sad reflection of the “other Malaysia” where the victims are its children. 

Put differently, the country’s poor children are incurring the wrath of growing inequality in the country.  

Furthermore, it’s an indictment of Malaysia’s development narrative where poor families are unable to provide food, financial security and a decent future for their children.

According to the report, nearly half of the parents living in low-cost flats throughout Kuala Lumpur don’t have enough money to buy food. 

The statistics only get worse: nearly eight out of ten families do not have even one ringgit in savings as most of them live from hand to mouth, while one in three families do not have EPF, social security or medical insurance. 

This shows they are extremely vulnerable and will be bankrupt when faced with a crisis.

The PPR flats are BN’s brainchild to make housing affordable for the poor. However, it has failed to look into habitability, security and maintenance of these places. 

And despite knowing that the urban poor live here, the government has also failed to look into policies to ensure sufficient wages and equal access to food, education and adequate recreational space for families and their children. 

Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak seems focused only on propping up meaningless numbers to say the country is experiencing good economic growth. 

These numbers don’t tell the story of the “other Malaysia” – where poor families and children are left out of the country’s socioeconomic and political development. 

While we may have reduced absolute poverty in the country, relative poverty is growing, as shown through the families in PPR flats.

We need higher salaries, better food and better education for these kids to grow in a conducive environment.

As such, it’s time for Najib to go back to the drawing board to rethink development in the country, and to frame ideas and actions to secure social safety nets for the poor, including closing the gap between the rich and the poor. 

I also call upon the government to extend the study to other urban areas in the country as well.


CHARLES SANTIAGO is Klang MP.

The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of Malaysiakini.

 

ADS