5% OIL AND GAS ROYALTY FOR SABAH

KOTA KINABALU Member of Parliament Dr. Hiew King Cheu asked the Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Abdul Razak during the Parliament sitting in July 2010 the question on actually how much Sabah had had received in total the amount on the 5% oil and gas royalty since the formation of Petronas until now.

The Prime Minister in his reply said the off shore oil and gas in Sabah is only 5% on the total amount on the revenue received. Protronas paid to the Sabah Government a total sum of RM5.3 billion until 31st March 2010.The payment is paid directly to the Sabah state government.

The decision on how to utilize the 5% petroleum money is entirely up to the state government for its development projects. On top of that the Federal government had also came up with its funding of RM20.2 billion which is under the 9th Malaysia Plan.

Dr. Hiew viewed the figures on the 5% oil and gas royalty as total not attractive and not any good for Sabahan. The total revenue created from the production of our Sabah crude oil and gas for the past many years since the forming of Petronas should be well over and more than RM110 billion, if the PM’s figure is correct.

Thus, the RM5.3 billion spreads over the period of almost 40 years is definitely nothing great to talk about. The yearly budget of Sabah State is already reaching RM3 billion or more per year. Therefore, the 5% of Petronas sharing of our precious oil and gas is actually classified as “peanuts”!

As the PM mentioned about the RM20.2 Billion allocation from the Federal to Sabah under the 9th Malaysia Plan, we actually wonder how much of the so called allocation had been made to Sabah over the pass years.

The figure did not add up and at least there should be some RM4 billion yearly to be deposited in Sabah. Where is the money as budgeted and why it is not delivered? Do we see during the past many years any substantial development projects going on in Sabah? The answer is surely no.

Dr. Hiew on the other hand feels that the people should deserve a better deal from the partnership in Malaysia and not being exploited and being ill treated as second class. We deserve the equal rights and should share equally the country wealth as laid done by the constitutional right. The taking away 95% of the Sabah oil and gas revenue while just leaving us 5% is already a breach of the contract.

Sabah should be enjoying much more development on the gifts (oil and gas) from the mother earth, but very sad is the case that we are left far behind without much development and progress until today, while the Semananjong counter part is enjoying the bulk of the oil and gas revenue.

It needs not be reminded that Sabahan should stand up and together we should find ways to gain more on the sharing of our oil and gas. The likely solution is suggested to change to BN government to a new government managed by Pakatan Rakyat.