SARAWAK opposition leader Chong Chieng Jen says he is baffled by the deafening silence from Prime Minister Najib Razak on corruption in the Budget 2018.

“Not a single word about corruption throughout his two-hour speech.

“Najib did not mention a word of corruption while corruption is the single biggest issue, both nationally and internationally, for Malaysia, especially with the 1Malaysia Development Bhd issues, the RM40 million bust against the political secretary of the human resources minister and the RM1.5 billion in graft probe into the ex-rural development ministry officers.

“To Najib, it is as if corruption is a non-issue in Malaysia.

“Or maybe he subscribes to the idiom that ‘people who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones’,” the Sarawak DAP chief and Bandar Kuching MP said today.

Chong said Najib’s lackadaisical attitude towards corruption is reflected in the allocation for the Malaysia Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC).

He said even though the allocation increased to RM242.1 million from last year’s RM216.2 million, it “is about the same allocation of RM241.1 million for 2016, and a lot less than the allocation of RM265 million for MACC in 2015”.

“Without serious efforts to combat corruption, billions of our people’s money will continue to be pocketed by corrupted officers and ministers.

“It will continue to bloat up our national debt and burden our future generations with the repayment of debt.”

Chong also accused the ruling Barisan Nasional government of continuing to rely on “tax terrorism practice” to sustain its spending.

He described “tax terrorism” as collecting taxes by employing ruthless and oppressive measures to terrorise the business community and individual.

He pointed out that in 2014, the income tax collected from individuals and companies was only RM89.6 billion, while this year, collection is projected to go up to RM97.8 billion and the estimate for next year is RM104.6 billion.

“This increase in income tax collection is in addition to the imposition of the GST (goods and services tax), which increases the government’s tax collection on indirect tax (export and import duties, sales & services tax and GST) from RM37.4 billion in 2014 to (a projected) RM64.8 billion in 2018.

“In other words, the income tax and indirect tax on the people increased from RM127 billion in 2014 to RM169.4 billion next year, an increase of RM42.4 billion tax on the people within four years.”

He said with the current economic situation, such an increase in tax could only be achieved by way of “tax terrorism”.

“With annual additional tax of RM20 to RM40 billion taken away from the people, it is no wonder that everyone is hard pressed for money to spend, which ultimately resulted in a very sluggish business environment since the implementation of GST in 2015.” – October 28, 2017.