Media Statement by Loke Siew Fook in Petaling Jaya on Thursday, 21^st May 2009:

Endless mishaps and cases of incompetency in the national service programme prove that it must be suspended and reviewed now

The National Service Training Department has once again shown their grave incompetency in safeguarding the welfare of the many young Malaysians who being are involuntarily placed in their sub-standard camps. The department has also exposed their own ineptness in dealing with simple administrative tasks.

The continued occurrences of more health and hygiene related disasters such as the recent outbreak of flu in a Semenyih camp and the instance of food poisoning in a Pasir Mas camp are just a few out of the countless examples of the authorities’ untrustworthiness.

Despite repeated promises to improve the condition of camps and to review health procedures, the same problems never fail to appear again.

The mailing of 10,800 call-up letters to the wrong addresses is a comical mishap and a sign of serious incompetence on the part of the department.

In addition, Defence Minister Datuk Seri Dr Ahmad Zahid Hamidi’s bizarre proposal to gather 417,000 former national service trainees and to gauge their patriotism is another nonsensical development in this failed experiment. How can he gauge these people’s patriotism in such a short time? And by whose standards shall these ‘trained’ citizens adhere to? Barisan Nasional’s?

DAPSY would like to reiterate its stand that the National Service Training Programme must be suspended immediately and put up for review. The programme is not just an avenue for corruption and cronyism and a total waste of taxpayer’s funds, but also a free pass to spread nonsense.

* Loke Siew Fook, DAP Socialist Youth (DAPSY) National Chairman & MP for Rasah