Professing care for people’s welfare need to go beyond words and Pakatan Rakyat (PR) has shown it in abundance since 2008. Some of the welfare and assistance programs started in PR states have had profound effect, forcing even the BN federal government to follow suit with its universal aid programs such as its BR1M and other programs.

Land for the masses

• In November 2008, Perak started converting leasehold land status to freehold status for its new village and Malay settlement village occupants.
• Around 47000 new village and 102000 Malay village households would have benefitted from the unprecedented move.
• 10000 Orang Asli families in Perak were also on track to receive individual land plots totalling 32,537 hectares, first time in Malaysian history

Roof over our heads

• 24 families of Kg Buah Pala, victims of land transferring scheme, were compensated with houses worth RM600,000 per unit as compensation in their original village
• 1422 Bukit Botak settlers are in the process of receiving houses that were promised by BN over 30 years ago but completed by PR. 961 individuals have already received offer letters for houses due to be completed in March 2012.

Restoring dignity for the poor

• Penang’s Equitable Economic Agenda, introduced in November 2012, will ‘top-up’ households with monthly income below RM 770 to RM 770 monthly. Thousands of poor wage earners will benefit from this program.
• Penang’s Partner against Poverty (RAK), a program to help hardcore poor, provides 859 individuals with over RM 225,000 in monthly welfare aid. More than 80 percent of the recipients are Malays.
• Since 2008 Selangor has spent around RM 766 million on its Making The Economy People First (MES) program. 1.2 million state residents have benefitted from many initiatives (e.g free water, university entrance gift)

Making care real

• Under Selangor’s Women Health Scheme, 17000 women have received free mammograms.
• Kelantan and Selangor are the first states to introduce the 90 days maternity leave for their state civil service.
• Widowed Selangor women civil servants also gets 30 days compassionate leave, highest in the country

Honouring our elders

• Kelantan’s Kifalah (bereavement) scheme, introduced in 2007, provides RM 1500 in burial aid to relatives of all senior citizens 60 years and above.
• Kedah, Penang and Selangor also have such schemes. PR states are the only ones in the country to do so.
• In Penang’s Senior Citizen Appreciation Scheme, senior citizens aged 60 years old and above receive RM 100 in annual cash gifts. Around 90 percent of Penang’s senior citizens have benefitted from it.
• Selangor also has Jom Shopping program that provides gift vouchers.