KOTA KINABALU: DAP Sabah has called on Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak to first seriously consider cutting the government subsidies for Independent Power Plants (IPPs).
Its assistant secretary Junz Wong said the Barisan Nasional (BN) Government should cut the subsidies for IPPs instead of cutting the people’s subsidies as one of the subsidy rationalization measures in an attempt to cope with the declining current surplus.
He recounted that in the 2012 national budget, IPPs were given a total of RM8 billion as subsidy when all these companies were already making lucrative profits.
“IPPs are mostly public-listed companies such as YTL Power and Powertek etc which recorded a profit of RM1.6 billion on revenue of RM13 billion and RM450million on revenue of RM1.34 billion respectively,” said Junz when commenting on the government’s recent decision to increase the price of RON95 petrol and diesel.
By cutting IPP subsidy, Junz said the Federal Government would be able to save more than RM3.3 billion a year so it only made more sense to do so.
“Why cut the rakyat subsidies? Rakyat welfare must be given first priority. Cut other subsidies first to prove Najib’s slogan of “Rakyat didahulukan” is not just an election war cry,” he contended.
Junz who is also Likas assemblyman refuted Kinabatangan MP Datuk Bung Moktar’s statement on the increase in price of RON95 petrol and diesel fuel would not affect the normal citizens especially the rural villagers citing his statement as childish and insulting to Malaysians after 50 years of independence.
“Does Bung not know that most automobile consumers (almost 80%) come from the middle and lower class households? With such ineffective public transportation system, most blue collars are forced to buy cars to work. So what does he mean when he says the increment of petrol price will not affect the normal citizens like us as those car owners usually are the rich?” Junz asked.
According to Junz, petrol and diesel fuel price hike will directly increase the transportation costs from the already relatively high logistics costs in Sabah due to lack of good basic infrastructure.
As a result, he said it would cause higher prices of commodities and eventually pass down the burden to end consumers be it normal citizens or rural villagers. “Everyone in general will suffer in one way or another especially in Sabah. His (Bung) statement only shows how arrogant and ignorant the BN parliamentarian is.
“Ordinary folks are already preparing to face hardships via soon-to-rise high costs of living in Sabah from the economic spillover effects of the 20 sen increase in petrol and diesel fuel price.
“Who will understand the agony and frustrations of their difficulties to make ends meet,” Junz added.