Sabah activist Zainnal Ajamain. (Facebook pic) KOTA KINABALU: Sabah
rights activist Zainnal Ajamain has accused Finance Minister Lim Guan
Eng of impertinence for saying that the formula for revenue sharing
between Putrajaya and the East Malaysian states cannot be applied until
the federal government can afford to do so.
Zainnal told FMT Lim
was presuming he had the power to decide when to give Sabah and Sarawak
their rights and displaying his ignorance of the Federal Constitution’s
position on the issue.
He was referring to a statement Lim made in the Dewan Rakyat on Wednesday.
“Lim
may be the finance minister, but this does not give him the authority
to make an announcement on this important issue,” he said.
“Putrajaya
has no choice but to pay Sabah and Sarawak what is due to them. This is
provided for in the Federal Constitution. There are no two ways about
it.”
Under the constitution, Putrajaya is obliged to pay Sabah 40%
of the net revenue it collects from the state. For Sarawak, the amount
is fixed as an annual income but is subject to review under Article 112D
of the constitution.
However, Sabah too has been receiving a fixed amount – RM26 million a
year – since 1964, although the annual revenue the federal government
collects from the state has been increasing since. International Trade
and Industry Minister Darell Leiking has said Putrajaya’s total debt to
Sabah has come to about RM1 trillion.
Zainnal spoke of the 1990s as a time of plenty and noted that Dr Mahathir Mohamad was then serving as prime minister.
“He
did not pay Sabah and Sarawak then because he was so busy constructing
the Petronas Twin Towers, Sepang Circuit and KLIA and organising LIMA
(Langkawi International Maritime & Aerospace Exhibition).
“Now Putrajaya is saying the government is in debt and therefore will pay only when it is able.”
He
pointed out that the revenue-sharing terms are specified in Annex A of
the Malaysia Agreement and that the annex is now part of the Federal
Constitution.
He accused Putrajaya of mismanaging funds and penalising Sabah and Sarawak for its own negligence.
The federal government had spent extravagantly to benefit only Peninsular Malaysia, he said.
“Therefore,
Putrajaya should excuse us if we don’t have any empathy for the problem
it is facing,” he added. “Its debts have nothing to do with Sabah and
Sarawak.”
He suggested what he said was a “simple” way to fulfil
Putrajaya’s obligation to Sabah: let the Sabah finance ministry collect
all taxes and other payments due to the federal government and surrender
only 60% of the collection to Putrajaya.
“Sabah can retain 40% of
the collection as provided for in Schedule 10, Part IV, Item 2 of the
Federal Constitution,” he said. “In this way, Sabahans are assured that
whatever is collected from them is given back directly to them.
“For
more than five decades, we’ve allowed Kuala Lumpur, and then Putrajaya,
to collect for us. And always Kuala Lumpur or Putrajaya will come up
with some excuse or other to deny Sabah and Sarawak what is due to them.
“This is a very unequal partnership. Putrajaya is taking advantage of the Sabah and Sarawak governments’ passivity.”
My comments:
The governments of Sabah and Sarawak should take right course of actions based on MA63 to claim back all the revenues that belong to Sarawak and Sabah. To do so, the governments of both countries should turn off all the taps for the flow of revenues to the Malaya coffer. Abang Johari of Sarawak should shorten the grace of Petronas from end of 2019 to end of 2018 to teach the Malayan colonial power a lesson of respect and integrity.
