National Service to stay despite another death

NST: KUALA LUMPUR: The National Service programme will not be scrapped despite another death among the 18-year-old trainees.
National Service Training Department director-general Datuk Abdul Hadi Awang Kecil reiterated that the training programme will not be scrapped "just because of one or two deaths (this year)".
"It is our policy that the NS camps go on. What we are doing now is to rectify the problem," he told the New Straits Times.
He was commenting on calls by bloggers for the scrapping of the programme following the death of 18-year-old Too Hui Min on Wednesday. She was the 16th NS trainee to have died during training since the programme began four years ago.
Abdul Hadi said the department's officials would be meeting Health Ministry officials on June 3 to decide on a technical committee to make it compulsory for all trainees to undergo health check-ups before entering the three-month programme.
Several departments have to streamline the processes before the health check-ups can be done.
In Too's case, Abdul Hadi said the trainee had a colon problem.
"She might have been suffering from it for a long time and was not aware of it."
He also said that the department was doing its best to ensure that the facilities in the camp were safe by getting the Health Ministry and the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health to certify the campus premises.
The chairman of the National Service Training Council is Tan Sri Lee Lam Thye.
Participants, aged 18, go through a three-month programme likened to a summer camp.