KUCHING: Sarawak may abolish the cabotage policy which requires all goods to enter the state through Port Klang, said Deputy Chief Minister Tan Sri Dr James Masing.
Masing, who is also Development of Infrastructure and Ports Minister, saw the possibility of the abolishment as practical, as the complaints came from the shippers themselves, the stakeholders affected by the policy.
“There is a possibility that it might happen because I have a lot of shippers coming to see me, and they are not happy with the cabotage policy.
“It is practical, it’s for the shippers, they are the stakeholders, if the stakeholders are not happy, who am I (to reject)” he told the media after delivering a special address at the Sarawak International Business and Economic Summit, here, today.
Masing said the decision whether to abolish it relied on the state government.
“The state government can decide on its own…we will look into that carefully,” he said.
He noted that Sarawak had the most number of ships in the country.
A similar view was voiced out by Chief Minister Datuk Amar Abang Johari Openg in 2017 in which he was reported as saying that he and the state cabinet ministers viewed the repeal of the policy as among the ways to lessen the price of goods in Sarawak.
He was also quoted as saying that the move would also ease efforts to develop the state’s basic infrastructure as the construction material also needed to be imported and sent through Port Klang. – Bernama
