NO NEED FOR FEDERAL FUND WITH OIL ROYALTY AND TAXES COLECTED FROM SABAH

No need for federal fund with higher oil royalty – STAR

KOTA KINABLU Feb 15, 2012: State Reform Party (STAR) said that with a higher oil royalty of 50 per cent for Sabah, the state would not even need anymore federal allocation.

Its deputy chairman, Daniel John Jambun, said this in response to the query by Sabah Barisan Nasional secretary Datuk Abdul Rahman Dahlan who expressed worry that Sabah would be worse off than what it is in now should the federal allocation under the Malaysia Plan be reduced.

“Abdul Rahman is forgetting that under the 10th Malaysia Plan, Sabah and Sarawak combined are getting only about RM9 billion as compared to about RM100 billion for the Peninsular,” Jambun pointed out.

“At this rate of allocation, Sabah is actually getting less than RM1 billion per year throughout the five-year Malaysia Plan. As such, the federal allocations are not much and hardly fulfil all the development needs of Sabah.”

Jambun also said that if the BN government is replaced by the opposition in Sabah, the state will also be asking for the original promised right to allow it to collect and manage its own revenues, including taxes.

“Taxes collected from Sabah alone amounts from RM15 to RM20 billion per year, so just imagine how much we are losing at the moment,” he said. “So combined that with the retention of income from oil by way of 50 per cent royalty, the income for Sabah per year would be in the tens of billions per year. So why would we need anymore allocation from Sabah?”

He said with such a huge revenue base, Sabah would be able to take care of its own education, health and even security costs.

“In fact Sabah would be a very rich state and would reach a developed status within a decade or two,” he added.

“So it is a pity that the BN leaders still have this outdated thinking that we must depend on the federal government forever to develop, whereas the real solution is right in our own backyard.”