He told the Dewan Rakyat on Monday that human capital development was important to the armed forces, saying it would ensure personnel were competent in handling modern weapons and other defence assets.
"The focus in human capital development is to ensure personnel are action-oriented, knowledgeable, skillful and having leadership qualities apart from cultivating resilience and high fighting spirit.
"Special programmes have been implemented to improve their knowledge," he said in reply to Datuk Raime Unggi (BN-Tenom) who wanted to know the initiatives taken by the government to strengthen the armed forces.
The minister said the country's defence industry should also be strengthened so that it could become self-reliant without having to depend too much on the foreign suppliers.
