Davao City Malaysian consulate has a new consul general in the person of Mohd Jafri Bin Mohd Sharif.
Sharif who has just seated as consul general for 14 days replaced Abdullah Zawawi Tahir who served the agency for three years.
Sharif commented that he sees Davao City as a “good place” with “very good people”, even pointing out his physical similarities with Filipinos.
“Some people even talked to me in Tagalog because they thought I am a Filipino,” he said.
Before being appointed as consul general, according to Sharif, from March to December 2016, he was part of the international monitoring team assigned in Cotabato City to observe and to report the situation of peace process to the GPH and MILF panel. The Malaysian government serves as the third party in the peace talks between the Philippine government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).
The consul general identified some of the specific tasks of the international monitoring team such as monitoring the effect of ceasefire violation or cessation of hostilities and in supporting Japan in providing socioeconomic assistance to conflict areas.
Sharif reported that part of the efforts of the Malaysian government to assist Mindanao was the Malaysian Technical Cooperation Program (MTCP).
MTCP is a program of the Malaysian government which aims to share development experience with other countries, strengthen bilateral relations between Malaysia and other developing countries, promote South-South Cooperation and promote technical cooperation among developing countries.
“We invite students from Mindanao and throughout Philippines to have a short course, one month in Malaysia and also in Mindanao. The previous one, we conducted automotive process and also cooking for women in Tagum for 12 days,” said Sharif.
The consul general added, they have trained 20 students for the automotive and another 20 students for the cooking course who were chosen with the assistance of the local government units.
Meanwhile, according to Sharif, the Malaysian government is still on the process of selecting the participants for the upcoming ASEAN at 50 to be hosted by the Philippines.
However, he assured that a number of investors have raised interest in the Philippines, pointing out four Palm oil companies that expressed interest in investing in Davao City.
Being the new consul general, Sharif is looking forward to learn more about Davao City, meet new friends and extend assistance to his fellow Malaysians as much as possible.
