November Declared as 1Malaysia National Family Month

KUALA LUMPUR, June 25 (Bernama) -- November has been declared as 1Malaysia National Family Month from this year, Prime Minister Najib Razak told the Lower House of Parliament on Monday. Najib who is also Women, Family and Community Development Minister, said the move was taken to give priority to the family perspective in the nation's socio-economic development. He said this was also in line with the 1Malaysia Family First Movement under the National Blue Ocean Strategy that was launched on June 17 through the implementation of the National Family Policy. "The ministry stresses on strengthening of the family institution as it is key to a country's success," said Najib in reply to a question from opposition's MP, Zuraida Kamaruddin. Najib said companies which organised Family Day for their workers would get a rebate or 100 per cent cut on the celebration expenditure. Najib also told the House that the government was ensuring that competent women be made members of public-listed companies's (PLCs) board of directors, in line with the government's decision to implement the policy of having at least 30 per cent women at the decision-making level in the corporate sector. Towards this end, he said the ministry had implemented the Women Directors' Programme aimed at enhancing their critical skills and knowledge in their role as members of companies' board of directors through structured training including in technical and soft skills. Najib said the target was to train 200 women company directors by December, 2012. "Twenty women directors of calibre had been trained in February and the next training in the series will be held next month (July)," he said. Besides that, he said, a directory of women members of companies' board of directors had been established in April as a source of reference for competent and suitable candidates among corporate women to be appointed to the PLCs. Najib also said that the ministry and TalentCorp were carrying out a programme to identify suitable employment for professional women including developing a micro-site, a data base specifically for professional women who wanted to return to work. He said the micro-site, to be launched next month, would have the role of matching this group of women with companies that could provide incentives and support facilities like flexible working arrangements. The companies involved, he added, would be given the incentive of double tax cuts on training expenditure beginning with the 2013 assessment year. In another development, Najib said 80,597 people had participated in the '1Azam' Programme (anti-poverty programme) between January 2011 and April 30, 2012 and the number was expected to reach 100,000 by the year-end. "This programme has shown its effectiveness based on the participation figure, especially from the 'ekasih' list and among rural and urban recipients of aid from the Social Welfare Department," he said. To a supplementary question from Zuraida on the appropriateness of Najib helming the Women, Family and Community Development Ministry, he said it was only temporary. "Don't worry about this. When we win the coming general election, we will hand over the ministry to a woman to lead," he said. The prime minister said whoever was leading the ministry should not be an issue, as what was important was the effectiveness of programmes implemented, enabling women in this country to achieve success to be proud of. Najib took over the ministry from Shahrizat Jalil who withdrew from the post when her term as senator ended on April 8, this year. -- BERNAMA