GTP + ETP = CORRUPTION

By: PKR MEDIA

PKR Supreme Council Member, Dr Roland Chia criticized that the fact that the federal government resorted to cut subsidies in order to reduce deficit is a failure of the so called Government Transformation Programme and Economic Transformation Plan.

The government is incapable of generating additional revenue to ease the burden of spending as well as its inability to cut leakages caused by corruption and poor project implementation. This is reflected in the RM28 billion lost annually to corruption, estimated to have cost the nation up to US$100 billion (RM303.06 billion) since the 1980s.

The People of Sabah should be exempted from these subsidies cut because Sabah being the second poorest state in Malaysia is one of the top three oil & gas producers state for Malaysia. It is liken to killing the goose that lay the golden eggs.

The removal of the super subsidy for diesel next month will have a major impact on consumer prices as associations affected by the cut has prepared to pass on additional fuel costs to end users. Such a move will definitely burden the ordinary people and not the rich. It is inevitable that transportation sector will pass the bulk of the increase to the consumers and the manufacturers. This is to safeguard their profit margins of the transportation sector.

The Domestic Trade, Co-operatives and Consumerism Ministry announced that diesel subsidies for nine categories of commercial vehicles will be abolished effective June 1.The nine categories comprise prime movers, general cargo movers, Luton box vans, vans, rigid lorries for bottled beverages, rigid tanker lorries for flour transport, rigid lorries for refrigerated goods, water tankers and limousine taxis.

To add salt into injury, the BN administration refusal to first cut billion-ringgit subsidies for independent power producers (IPPs) rather than burden the people with subsidy cuts on essential items. The government would only spur inflation by removing the diesel super subsidy before cutting gas subsidies worth RM19 billion for IPPs and commercial power sectors.

Dr Roland Chia said the government must take action against ‘fat crony companies’ like IPPs if it wished to reduce subsidy burden, as last year’s five-in-one subsidy cut would only save RM750 million while a 20 per cent cut in subsidies to IPPs would save RM3.6 billion.

He pointed out that in 2008, based on Petronas’ annual reports, gas subsidies granted to IPPs amounted to RM8.1 billion, while Tenaga Nasional Bhd (TNB) took RM5.7 billion. The first cuts should be the fat salaries of the top management of TNB & Petronas which amounted to up to RM1 Million per annum per director.

“This selfish move will definitely push the middle income and lower middle group to the poverty level,” Dr Roland Chia lamented.