PAKATAN Harapan today passed its first federal budget at policy stage with a voice vote.

Budget 2019 was passed after Finance Minister Lim Guan Eng wrapped up the debate in the Dewan Rakyat.

It was a lively debate that saw Lim interrupted several times by former finance minister Najib Razak, who had questions on the International Petroleum Investment Company (IPIC) repayments and the goods and services tax (GST) consolidated fund.

Damansara MP Tony Pua chimed in with the accusation that Najib was lying about the IPIC repayments. 

“I would like to expose lies by Pekan (Najib)... who pays who? 

“The facts are here, everyone knows only Pekan (Najib) doesn’t know,” said Pua.

Lim told the dewan that next year’s budget was zero-based to prevent “year-end Christmas shopping”. 

He said there was usually a rush to spend any money remaining in the allocation at the end of the year.

“They will try their best to use it (the allocation) up by the end of the year… this is something we want to prevent,” he said. 

Outside parliament, Lim said he was “relieved” that the first PH budget had been passed.

“There have been many challenges but the government hopes that everybody can sacrifice so that we can together overcome our challenging fiscal position,” Lim told reporters at the Parliament lobby.

Voting for the bill will go into committee stage next tomorrow. – November 21, 2018.