Situation in flood-hit states improves

KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 16  -- The situation in flood-hit areas in Sabah and Sarawak continued to show improvement today, as the number of evacuees at relief centres decreased.

The fine weather in SARAWAK saw the number of flood victims at the relief centres continued to drop to 3,780 people so far compared to 4,247 people this morning.

In SABAH, the number of evacuees remained at 183 people from 51 families.

However, the Malaysian Meteorological Department has issued a weather alert warning with heavy rains expected to continue in several areas in Sabah, Sarawak and Labuan until Monday.

In PAHANG, the number of evacuees decreased to 4,872 people from 1,352 families this evening, and they are housed at 62 relief centres in five districts.

In JOHOR, the number of evacuees at two relief centres in Segamat and Batu Pahat remained at 93, as of 4 pm today.

Of the total, 76 people were taking shelter at Sekolah Agama Gemereh while the remaining 17 people were being housed at Sekolah Kebangsaan Seri Bunut Parit Raja.

In another development, AmBank Group has announced a flood relief moratorium of up to six months to its customers who are currently affected by the floods.

Its managing director Datuk Sulaiman Mohd Tahir, in a statement said the moratorium would involve monthly instalments or repayments for all loans and financing facilities including credit card facilities.

He said the bank would also waive all incidental and replacement charges for customers seeking replacement of passbooks, cheque books, fixed deposit certificates, ATM, credit and debit cards.

-- BERNAMA