I had to deal with bold questions on my tenure as the former Human Resources Minister when I spoke to party supporters in Johor over the long weekend. In a dialogue session in Johor Baru, Yong Peng and Kluang, I was asked point blank what I had achieved in my 22-month tenure.
This dialogue session was also attended by DAP Johor state chairman Liew Chin Tong and Bekok assemblyperson S Ramakrishan.
I replied that the best way to describe my tenure was the words uttered by my successor Datuk Seri M. Saravanan, who took over the portfolio when a new government was formed last March.
Saravanan remarked to the press that he had to just follow through with the groundwork laid by his predecessor.
I also told the crowd that I was proudest of the work I had done in formulating a soon to be introduced law that covers 2.6 million housewives who merely work at home with Sosco coverage.
I said the present government was going to introduce the legislation soon. This initiative was started by the Pakatan Harapan Government during the 22 months that we held Putrajaya.
Besides this initiative, I also pointed out that the Harapan government had ramped up the registration of youths in the 32 Technical and vocational education and training (TVET) institutions throughout the country.
The first of these institutes was built in 1964 and since then dozens more have been set-up to help skill the youth of this country.
During my tenure as minister, we managed to enrol many Orang Asli youths in a skills training institute in Perak, a first of its kind in the country.
We had indeed done a lot and had a lot more that was in the midst of being done which is why Saravanan said what he did.
He also said that 17,000 had entered technical and vocational training programmes in 2018 and the figure has increased to 19,000 by early this year.
I told the crowd that in 2019, I had seen almost 4,000 people, who came to me with problems that needed to be solved by the Ministry. I had conducted the Hari Bertemu Pelanggan in order to meet as many people I could that had problems so that I could forward them to the Minister Officers for immediate action. These ministry officials were also in attendance to hear and tackle the problems head on.
We assisted where we could and the least we could do was to at least listen and advise these people. People were happy that at least they left with the feeling that the authorities had listened to them.
I said the problem of stateless people was the most difficult to resolve because almost 30,000 applicants for a blue IC had their papers vetted and were in order but approvals for citizenship were stalled at the Home Ministry.
This was such a big headache because although their papers were in order, the approvals were frozen.
Chin Tong was asked questions about who was to blame for the fall of the Pakatan Harapan government in late February this year, while Ramakrishnan, who was an exco member of the Harapan state government in Johor before it was upended by the PN coalition, talked about the state bureaucracy which presented a formidable challenge to the new Government.