Budget 2021 passes final stage in Dewan Rakyat with three vote majority

 

PARLIAMENT | Budget 2021 has passed the final stage in the Dewan Rakyat.

A bloc vote during the third reading ended with 111 MPs in favour, and 108 MPs against, with one MP absent.

A bloc vote earlier at the end of the committee stage also had the same result. 

The absent MP was Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah (BN-Gua Musang).

The supply bill will now head to the Senate to be debated and voted on.

The Dewan Rakyat currently has 220 members following the deaths of two MPs (Gerik and Batu Sapi). Thus 111 votes is a simple majority.

Earlier, the Dewan Rakyat passed the Education Ministry and Higher Education Ministry's budgets with a voice vote.

Overall the opposition bench moved and lost 11 bloc votes.

This includes nine bloc votes on individual ministry budgets during the committee stage - mostly against former Pakatan Harapan MPs turned Perikatan Nasional (PN) ministers - while the other 18 ministries were passed via voice votes.

The series of bloc votes at the committee stage followed an initial aborted plan to vote down the budget at the end of policy stage debates.

At the time, opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim's last-minute instructions to cancel the plan had sparked unhappiness among Harapan MPs.

In addressing the matter, four Harapan lawmakers previously told Malaysiakini that Anwar had offered to resign as the opposition leader if he fails to prove he commands majority support in the Dewan Rakyat.

Following the resignation promise which was conveyed verbally, a fake statement of Anwar vowing to do so was circulated using his office's letterhead.

The bloc votes and today's final vote is seen as a proxy confidence vote for Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin and is Harapan's only chance to oust him through the Dewan Rakyat, as speaker Azhar Azizan Harun has refused to allow the tabling of no-confidence motions by the opposition.

The Dewan Rakyat sitting for this session will end on Thursday. - Mkini