GABUNGAN Parti Sarawak’s (GPS) whip  and Sarawak’s Pakatan Harapan chief are quarreling over what percentage did Sarawak and Sabah get out of the RM56 billion development allocation in Budget 2020.

Fadillah Yusof, the GPS parliamentary chief whip, said the RM9.6 billion – RM4.5 billion to Sarawak and RM5.1 billion to Sabah – amounts to only 17.1%, short of the 30% PH promised to allocate to the two Borneo states.

But Sarawak PH chief Chong Chieng Jen today said the two states actually got 31.9% of the development  expenditure, so PH fulfilled its manifesto promise.

The Stampin MP and deputy domestic trade and consumer affairs minister said RM25.9 billion out of the RM56 billion development budget was for measures that were “not state specific” but benefitted all states.

He said the purchase of equipment for the armed forces and for the Economic Affairs Ministry to carry out an economic census were examples of measures that would benefit all states.

Fadillah rubbished Chong’s calculation as ridiculous and questioned the deputy minister’s sincerity to fight  for Sarawak. 

“If he is not a snake oil salesman, then he should not act like one to collude and conspire with the peninsula-based federal government to justify their inability to meet their promises and deprive of Sarawak and Sabah their rightful and promised allocations in Budget 2020,” the Petra Jaya MP said.

“A 30% share of development expenditure of RM56 billion for Sabah and Sarawak does not work out to be RM9.6 billion.

“It should be RM16.8 billion, not RM9.6 billion,” Fadillah said.

He said Sabah and Sarawak would not benefit from the allocation to reduce toll rates in the peninsula, which is expected to cost billions.

“Neither do we benefit from the ECRL (East Coast Rail Link), the MRT2, the LRT3 and other projects in peninsular Malaysia that were funded by the federal government.

“So, for DAP to suggest that Sabah and Sarawak should also bear a part of those allocations is ridiculous.”

Fadillah said for a start, Chong must insist that Sabah and Sarawak get RM16.8 billion for development expenditure in Budget 2020; 20% oil royalty and 50% of tax revenues collected from Sabah and Sarawak.

Chong said calculating the state-specific allocation of the development expenditure was used by the Barisan Nasional administration. 

He said Sabah and Sarawak got much less from the BN government, but none of the GPS MPs raised any objections.

“All those years, the Sarawak BN and their MPs simply kept quiet and did not dare say anything.

“Therefore, for the GPS MPs to now allege that the calculation of Sarawak’s portion of expenditure is RM4.5 billion out of the whole RM56 billion and thus Sarawak only gets 8% , such allegation is made based on twisted facts and malafide.

“There are 19 GPS MPs in Dewan Rakyat, many of them were federal ministers or deputy ministers. 

“They have either suffered mass dementia or they are simply being dishonest to the people of Sarawak trying to instigate anger based on distorted facts,” Chong said. – October 16, 2019.