MUKAH: The first sign that a rural place is developing in the right direction is when there is no more brain drain.

“This is what Mukah is currently experiencing. The Melanaus are coming back home because there are jobs here,” said Chief Minister Tan Sri Abdul Taib Mahmud, who is also Sarawak Barisan Nasional chief.

In the past, he said, most young educated youths went away from here to seek employment because there was nothing promising for them.

But times had changed, he said, after Mukah became the administrative centre for the Sarawak Corridor of Renewable Energy (SCORE) which has attracted multi-billion ringgit investments.

Today, Mukah has bigger commercial areas, better roads, more cars, more schools and institutions of higher learning, he said.

“Our future is bright and we must accelerate development in this area. We must prepare our children with the right education and they must be technically adept as well,” he said.

He also mentioned that the government would build a few more hydroelectric dams in Sarawak in the next 10 to 15 years.

“The next 20 years will be hard-work years and a challenging period for everyone. We must plan our politics well, we must prepare our workers well. Within 20 years we will be a developed nation,” he said to more than 3,000 people who gathered to celebrate “Pesta Kaul” at Kala Dana yesterday.

More than 300 stalls with colourful exhibits, handicrafts, food, dances, music and games are held for five days starting on April 24.

The Kaul festival is an annual event which the Melanaus have been holding for hundreds of years to celebrate their harvests from the land and sea.

Taib and wife Puan Sri Ragad Taib was on a whirlwind campaign here as well as to declare the festival open yesterday. After that he left for Bintulu.

On politics, he said Opposition leaders and candidates coming to Sarawak were no more than “medicine” peddlers on the five-foot way.

He said: “Thus they should be treated as such. Treat what they say with a pinch of salt. They try to convince voters that they have 1,001 solutions to all the people’s problem with only one medicine.”

He added in jest that Barisan candidate for Mukah, Datuk Dr Muhammad Leo Michael Toyad, 63, was not chosen because of his good looks but because he represented the party and the bigger picture of development for the constituency.

Dr Leo is seeking his eighth term as MP for Mukah. He is in a three-cornered fight with DAP’s Hai Merawin, 63, and Independent Sylvester Ajah Subah, 72.

(Source : Borneo Post Online , 29 April 2013)