Guan Eng comes under fire over 'overkill' Sarawak debt statement

A local Sarawak party president has taken a swipe at Finance Minister Lim Guan Eng for saying that the state government purportedly owes Putrajaya over RM2.5 billion, with RM50 million currently in arrears.

The Malay Mail quoted State Reform Party president Lina Soo as saying that Lim should have followed protocol when asking Sarawak to pay back its debts to the federal government, instead of issuing a media statement.

Soo, who described Lim's remarks as an "overkill", said the protocol would have been for him to approach his Sarawak counterpart to settle the debt instead of using the public domain.

"This is an overkill as the Sarawak Tourism, Arts Culture, Youth and Sports Minister Karim Rahman Hamzah was merely asking for Sarawak’s share of the tourism tax revenue as was promised by the federal government," Soo said.

In a statement yesterday, Lim made the remarks in response to Abdul Karim who claimed that Putrajaya owed the state RM2.32 million for its share of taxes collected from January until September last year.

Karim also said that Sarawak is owed a further RM439,731 for collection between September and December 2017.

"It would be wise for the Sarawak government to not make slanderous statements concerning the RM2.7 million in tourism tax disbursement considering, as at Nov 30, 2018, the state government still owes the federal government over RM2.5 billion, with arrears close to RM50 million," said Lim.

Soo, however, lashed out at Lim, claiming that his actions only showed the arrogance of federal ministers.

She reminded that a large portion of oil and gas revenues from Sarawak and Sabah had been used to fund mega infrastructure projects in peninsular Malaysia.

According to The Malay Mail, Soo also reminded Lim of Pakatan Harapan's election pledge of 20 percent oil royalty and 50 percent tax proceeds to be returned to Sarawak.

"The people of Sarawak have been duped by false promises," said Soo who urged Lim to apologise to Sarawakians for breaking Harapan's promise after being voted into power. - Mkini