State Reform Party (STAR) president Lina Soo called the State 2020 Budget a déjà vu budget as it contains ‘a little bit more of the same’ recycled from last year.
She first pointed to the Sarawak Digital Economy Strategy 2018 to 2022 encompassing precision agriculture, industry 4.0, tourism, smart city, e-commerce and digital government. Despite spending RM750 million with another RM400 million budgeted for 2020, not much has been achieved so far.
On RM450 per mother for post-natal care, she said it was good but too small for a mother during confinement when she has to build up her strength after nurturing and carrying an extra seven pounds for several months.
“Adding another zero to make it RM4,500 would have been more realistic especially when Sarawak is under-populated in relation to its land mass.”
Moving on the Sarawak Endowment Fund of RM1,000 for newborn babies, Soo said it is inadequate. Calculated at three percent of compound interest per annum, the maturity sum is RM1,702.43 after 18 years. This amount will have less purchasing power after taking inflation into account.
Revenue wise, Sarawak collected RM5.653 billion in the first three quarters of this year and the shortfall seems to be partly due to the failure of Petronas to pay the five percent state sales tax on petroleum.
“A Notice of Assessment has been issued but the public is kept in the dark with regards to the amount of tax to be paid and the deadline.
“If there is a deficit for 2019, will the state reserves be utilised? What corrective measures will be taken by the government to boost the peoples’ confidence in the surplus Budget tabled for 2020?” she asked.
If the state award licences for oil and gas prospecting and production to Petros (a state entity) which in turn is empowered to issue licences and leases, she hoped the process would be transparent and those profiting would not only be crony companies set up to capture the benefit for themselves.
Soo also lauded the decision to set up the Sarawak Coastal Guards but wondered if RM90 million to protect the long coastline is a
realistic figure.
“Furthermore, Sarawak needs to revive our famed Sarawak Rangers and Border Scouts to secure our porous borders with Kalimantan and Sabah.
“The security of our borders is a priority concern and Sarawak needs to internalise this as the federal government will not provide enough allocation for our security and peace of mind,” she told.
With respect to native customary rights (NCR) land, she said the RM40 million allocated for the purpose is woefully inadequate and unrealistic. The perimeters of 52,000 hectares are expected to be surveyed and 15,000 hectares will be surveyed with a view to issue individual titles.
“There is no timeline and the landowners have no idea when the surveys will be done and their individual titles finally realised.
“Much of the rural population is still in the dark over Section 6 and Section 18 which provide good political fodder and squabbling between Sarawak politicians at state and federal levels.
“Since Sarawak Pakatan Harapan (PH) MPs failed to get the allocation for the survey of land from the
federal Finance Ministry, the Sarawak government must take the initiative to resolve the issue internally, rather than squabble over federal funds which might never come,” she said.
With regards to the Village Security and Development Committee (Jawatankuasa Keselamatan dan Kemajuan Kampung — JKKK), Soo reminded the state government to restore the native customary democratic practice of electing Tuai Rumah and community leaders.
“The government extinguished the native ‘adat’ of electing Tuai Rumah and Ketua Kampung and replaced it with political
appointments,” she said.
In connection with the National Higher Education Fund (PTPTN) issue, few jobs have been created for graduates after so many years.
“The priority is to create jobs for them rather than offer to help settle their education loans,” Soo said.
On foreign investments, the state government has not rolled out incentives, tax policies and reliefs to attract foreign direct investments (FDI) into the manufacturing and food sectors.
She added that overall, the 2020 budget is a public relations effort to woo the rural population. There are not many benefits for city dwellers who have high electricity connection charges of up to more than RM10,000 for a two-storey
building.
“There is very little for squatters and landless city folk to look forward to as there is a dearth of land resettlement programmes and affordable housing schemes for the urban poor,” she said.
Soo then proposed to increase the state’s revenue from its own resources and use it pay for development and as for the state sales tax on oil and gas it should have been set at 20 percent for 2020.
As the federal government is collecting petroleum tax (Pita) from Petronas from 38 to 45 percent, apart from the dividends, other taxes and income it imposes, it is not unreasonable for Petronas to pay 20 percent state sales tax.
“This is a four-fold increase in revenue from RM3.491 billion to RM139.64 billion. After all, it is our oil and gas which belongs to the people of Sarawak and we have been languishing in poverty for too long,” she said.
