KUCHING: Owners of vehicles with engine capacities of more than 3000cc in Sarawak lauded the Federal Government's move to include them for the RM625 cash rebate offered after the hike in fuel prices.

Some owners had earlier threatened to ground transportation in rural areas, where four-wheel-drive (4WD) vehicles are the only mode of land transport to move people and goods, as they had become too expensive to operate.

Parti Rakyat Sarawak president Datuk Sri Dr James Masing, in thanking Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi for the decision, said this would help ease the financial burden.

Lihan Jok, state assemblyman for Telang Usan, another rural constituency in Baram, also thanked the government for easing the plight of hundreds of such vehicle owners in Baram.

President of the Sarawak Teachers' Union, William Ghani Bina, said the rebate would help ease the burden on rural school teachers who owned such vehicles to commute.

Langgang Tinggang, a 48- year-old who uses his 4WD to eke out a living, said unlike in the city, these vehicles were a necessity here.

"Without my 4WD, I cannot hope to reach my long house in Long Bemang. Neither can other vehicle owners.

"The rural roads are terrible. They are dusty in the dry season and dangerously slippery in the wet.

"These roads are not meant for family saloon cars or buses, only for 4WD and trucks," he said.

People like Tinggang have also become indispensable to friends and neighbours who cannot afford a 4WD.

A trip from Miri to remote settlements like Long Bemang or Long Lapok can take six to eight hours on untarred roads, or roads belonging to timber companies operating in the area. -NST