Special Sabah grant slashed in budget, says Warisan MP

 

Penampang MP Darell Leiking said the previous PH government had doubled the grant to RM53.4 million.

KOTA KINABALU: A former Warisan federal minister has questioned the federal government for reverting to the original special grant payment sum of RM26.7 million to Sabah.

Penampang MP Darell Leiking said the previous Pakatan Harapan administration had doubled the special grant amount to RM53.4 million in the last federal budget.

Leiking, who is also Warisan deputy president, said he noticed this after looking through the 2021 Budget book supplied to all MPs.

“I don’t know why they maintained the old figures (of special grant payment to Sabah) since 1972 which was RM26.7 million, it should have been RM53.4 million as the previous government had already approved the sum,” he told FMT.

He could not understand why the current government did not consider the proposal by the previous Cabinet Committee on the Malaysia Agreement 1963 (MA63), which was then supported by the federal Cabinet then.

He said the special grant to Sabah and Sarawak had never been reviewed since 1972. Sabah was to receive RM53.4 million for the next four years starting this year, with the sum increased to RM106.8 million in the fifth year.

“Now we are back again to RM26.7 million … it should have been higher or stayed at RM53.4 million,” Leiking said.

The special grant is stipulated in Article 112D of the Federal Constitution which states that Sabah has the right to 40% of net revenue derived by the federal government from the state.

Sarawak also received an increase in special grant payment in the last budget at RM32 million.

Leiking was also unhappy the federal government had slashed the development allocation to Sabah to RM5.1 billion. The PH government had given RM5.2 billion previously.

“Although they did allocate some for tourism development, but the cultural village development allocation was not given to Sabah. We also have a lot of cultural villages in the state.”

Former Sabah health minister Frankie Poon said he had hoped the federal government would increase funding on health in Sabah given the spike in Covid-19 cases.

“Sabah is a big state in terms of population and geographical size. Given this, Sabah needs a lot of funds for its well-being,” said the Sabah DAP acting chief.

State DAP youth chief Phoong Jin Zhe said that besides the Pan Borneo Highway project, there was nothing to shout about in terms of infrastructure projects in Sabah.

“There will be a new bus rapid transit (BRT) project in Johor but yet Kota Kinabalu is still waiting. In 2015, the former prime minister Najib Razak had announced the BRT will be built here,” he said.

Phoong said the state infrastructure development minister Bung Moktar Radin should raise this matter as well as the slashed overall development allocation to Sabah in Parliament. - FMT