Dr M instructs gov't to halt GST, impose fixed petrol price

Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad today instructed the government to stop collecting GST and impose a fixed petrol price.

"The instruction has been given so we will no longer collect GST," he told a press conference at his Perdana Leadership Foundation in Putrajaya.

Whatever excess taxes collected under GST will be refunded, he added.

Scrapping GST was among the promises Pakatan Harapan made for its first 100 days in power if the coalition assumed federal power.

Yesterday, former Bank Negara governor Zeti Akhtar Aziz of the Council of Eminent Persons set up by Mahathir to guide his new government, said scrapping the GST completely may take more than 100 days.

Meanwhile, Mahathir also said the government would no longer continue with the weekly price adjustments for fuel prices that were practised by the previous government.

"No longer up and down, the present (market) rate will stay. The government will subsidise if there are insufficiencies," he said.

The weekly fuel price system was implemented on March 30 last year, and is calculated based on regional benchmark prices provided by Means of Platts Singapore (Mops).

However, for five weeks prior to the May 9 general election, the then BN government maintained the same price despite increasing regional fuel prices. - Mkini