FORMER prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad said unnecessary projects by the federal government can be axed to deal with the country’s debt.

The Pakatan Harapan (PH) chairman, who ran the government for 22 years from 1981 to 2003, named the RM55 billion East Coast Rail Link (ECRL) as a project he considered unnecessary.

“The ECRL can be cancelled. The east coast has had rail for over 100 years but it never brought profit.

“People can fly to get to Kuala Lumpur from the east coast. The rail is unpopular, it will bring losses,” he said in a live interview on Facebook earlier today with Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia (Bersatu) women’s wing (Srikandi) chief Rina Harun.

Dr Mahathir is the chairman of Bersatu.

When launching the ECRL earlier this month, Prime Minister Najib Razak had described it as a “game changer” and “mindset changer” for Malaysia as it will significantly cut travel time to and from the east coast of the peninsula.

Dr Mahathir was asked how PH would pay the national debt and whether it would continue with projects announced by Najib’s administration if the opposition pact took over Putrajaya. Bank Negara figures for 2016 had put external debt at RM908.7billion.

Dr Mahathir, who was criticised during his tenure for building mega projects, listed down several other mega projects and their cost.

“The ECRL, RM55 billion; the HSR (High Speed Rail), RM60 billion and MRT (Mass Rapid Transit), RM50 billion. All this we can deal with by reducing unimportant projects,” he said.

During the interview, Dr Mahathir took questions sent in by Facebook users. One had asked if it was true that Najib had no power to control oil prices.

“We have no power to set the global oil prices, but we can reduce the retail price of petrol in the country.

“The retail price includes tax. If we reduce the tax and increase the subsidy, the price of petrol can be reduced,” he said. – August 24, 2017.