23 February, MELAKA – Bank Islam Malaysia Berhad (Bank Islam) has spent RM7.16 million to build and repair 265 houses under its Housing Aid Programme over a 10-year period since 2008.
Its chief executive officer, Khairul Kamarudin said the programme covered nine states, namely Kelantan, Terengganu, Kedah, Pahang, Negeri Sembilan, Sarawak, Perak, Johor and Melaka.
The cost of building a new house under the programme is between RM53,000 and RM55,000 while repairing a house costs RM15,000 to RM20,000.
“The awareness to take proactive measures to eradicate poverty should be instilled in all as a shared responsibility and not leave it solely to the government.
“Hopefully, our assistance extended could lessen the recipients burden and give them home comfort,” he said after the handing-out of mock keys of their homes to 27 recipients from Negeri Sembilan and Melaka by Chief Minister Datuk Seri Idris Harun, here, today.
The recipients were also each given RM500 in cash and daily necessities worth RM200.
Khairul said a sum of RM855,000 was also channelled through a business fund last year to build eight new houses in Melaka and one in Negeri Sembilan, as well as to repair 18 houses in Melaka under the Bank Islam Housing Aid Programme.
He said the programme would also be implemented in Sabah soon to help those eligible for the aid in the state.
He added that Bank Islam always placed economic development to be in tandem with peoples wellbeing and this had always been part and parcel of its operations and identity.
Each year, we allocate a zakat sum to carry out corporate social responsibility activities including extending aid to school and college students, the poor, orphans, converts and Orang Asli to help raise their socio-economic status.
One of recipients of a new house under the programme, Abu Samah Ibrahim, 61, from Tedong, here, said he and his family were touched and grateful as their dream of owning a house finally came true although at his rather late age.
The father of three said he and his family had been living together with a younger brother and the latter family in a rundown house that was over 80 years old, left by their late mother.
A new home was built for them by Bank Islam as it would cost more to repair it.
Another new house recipient, Norazia Morsin, 35, a single mother with wife children, said they previously had to stay in a relatives old, rundown house that was unoccupied for four years.
She said she and her children were happy and grateful as they could now sleep in comfort and did not have to worry about their safety living in a new house.
– BERNAMA