KOTA KINABALU: The word corruption needs to be better defined as some expenses are considered necessary for businesses and have to be recognised.
Malaysia International Chamber of Commerce and Industry (MICCI) Sabah branch chairman Datuk Tan Cheng Kiat said corruption was the number one disease in many developing countries, but how we handle it is important.
He said “corruption” had been practised in developed countries for many years except that it was called ‘donations’ in America or “lobbying fees” in Australia.
“When you have to get approval, you have to engage a lobbyist, usually an ex-politician, mayor or director-general, who has all the network.
“For you to facilitate quick approval, you need to pay a lobbyist for the job,” Tan said.
He said a lobbyist is a new profession that needed to be recognised and legalised in a way so that the Goods and Services Tax (GST) could apply and income tax could be collected.
“If we do not legalize all these things, money will be going overseas, and unaccounted for,” he said at the MICCI Sabah branch annual luncheon here yesterday.
The luncheon was graced by Deputy Chief Minister cum Minister of Industrial Development Datuk Seri Panglima Raymond Tan Shu Kiah who represented Chief Minister Datuk Seri Panglima Musa Aman.
Tan said his friend who wanted to develop a property in Sydney, Australia had paid a lot for legal fees, lobbying fees and consent fees, which would be regarded as corruption in Malaysia.
Because our country does not have this classification, Tan said the expenses were lumped into the word ‘corruption’, with bad connotation.
“Some of the expenses are needed to accelerate approvals, to get things smoother. We pay for a lot of things, why not we pay for this and pay to the right people to do the right job? And it does not have to be called corruption or under-table money,” Tan reckoned.
Assuming the word ‘donation’ can be written down in expenses account, Tan said the expenses could then be charged against the sales income and claim for tax.
“But if I give people under-table money, corruption money, I cannot report it. The people who receive it also cannot report it as income,”he said.
Tan said such expenses have to be recognised that they are necessary for business.
Corruption is one of the 4C’s which Tan regarded as necessary to be addressed in order for our country to move forward. The remaining C’s include clarity, especially in the 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) issue, Cabotage policy and confidence of investors.
On the subject of the Cabotage policy, Tan stressed that the policy was definitely responsible for the higher costs of goods in Sabah.
He claimed that many local shipping companies were owned by politicians, and even gone to the extent of naming MCA members and Sarawakians, making it hard to talk about the Cabotage policy.
But he challenged the state leaders to remove the Cabotage policy.
It may take a year, two years or three years, Tan said, but doing so would send a message to Sabahans that our leaders are effective and cared about Sabah and Sarawak.
“A tough subject but one that needs to be handled,” he said.