KUCHING: Sixteen questions and 20 supplementary questions were answered by a minister and assistant ministers during the question-and-answer session of the State Legislative Assembly (DUN) sitting yesterday.
All of them came from Barisan Nasional (BN) elected representatives except for five posed by See Chee How (PKR-Batu Lintang) and Fong Pau Teck (IND-Pujut).
The one-hour session went well without bickering while the only minister taking questions was Deputy Chief Minister and Minister of Modernisation of Agriculture Datuk Patinggi Tan Sri Alfred Jabu, who replied on behalf of the chief minister.
Fong asked the chief minister about the number of Bangladeshi and Indonesian workers in the state. After Jabu responded to his question, Fong further queried how many out of the numbers provided were illegal workers.
Maintaining his cool, Jabu said the figures he told the House were based on the records of the Immigration Department, which would not indicate the number of those entering the state illegally.
When pressed, Jabu reiterated: “We do not know the figure on the illegal workers, that is why I asked Pujut to tell us.”
Earlier, instead of posing his question the usual way by reading out the number, Abu Seman Jahwie (BN-Jemoreng) stressed the importance of being given a hearty answer.
