I got a lesson this afternoon on how our welfare system is failing the poor, the blind and the orphaned.
Sagita from Sabah , has low vision and categorized as legally blind. Her father died last year and her family moved to her grandmother's house which grandma shares with 2 blind brothers.
Her widowed mother applied for zakat aid in Tawau over a year ago and Baitulmal promised to visit but nobody has turned up yet. So they receive no aid.
Sagita who is doing computer skills training at MAB in KL went to MAWIP to ask for welfare but they said she is not entitled unless she has been in KL for a year.
Someone from Persatuan Nelayan ( Fishermen's Association) called to look for her father and when told he had passed away , informed her mother that she could have received rm50,000 life insurance from his death - but it's too late to apply now.
Meantime at the hostel for the blind where she stays, the canteen operator was recently changed . His unhygienic food preparation has led to her and many students getting food poisoning, and she was taken to clinic after she fainted from dehydration.
The only saving grace is that she qualified for 50% discount today at the Tun Hussein Eye hospital when she made a pair of glasses to enable her to see better. However how many of the poor can afford spectacles that cost RM220 even after the discount?
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