Orang Asli villagers repair roads, bridges to send children to school

GUA MUSANG, July 22 -- A total of 40 Orang Asli villagers in Pos Balar, here, have taken it upon themselves to repair damaged roads and rebuild four temporary wooden bridges to enable them to send their children to Sekolah Kebangsaan (SK) Balar today.

Pos Balar Tok Batin (village head) Alek Busu, 58, said that they organised a gotong-royong after they collected 300 pieces of wood from nearby forest to rebuild the temporary bridges to connect the villages to school.

He said that as today was the first day of school reopening for Years One to Four pupils, the villagers tried their best to rebuild the bridges that collapsed during recent floods.

“We hope that the government can replace our temporary bridges with new one made of concrete which will be a lot safer for us to use,” he told reporters here.

Last week, more than 7,000 Orang Asli living in seven settlements including Pos Balar, Tohoi, Bihai, Simpor, Gob, Belatim and Hendrop here were trapped after access roads were damaged and the bridges collapsed following heavy rain.

One of the villagers, Aja Along, 40, from Kampung Perawas, Pos Balar, said that he and 19 other friends had to spend the night in the forest to collect 300 pieces of wood to build the temporary bridges.

“Although these bridges will not last but we still build them for the sake of our children education and hope the government can build us a better and safer bridge soon,” he said.

-- BERNAMA