PBK treasurer says budget a letdown

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Jamie Tiew

SIBU: Parti Bumi Kenyalang (PBK) treasurer-general Jamie Tiew described the recent Sarawak Budget  as a letdown as it favours certain segment of the people rather than a budget for all Sarawakians.

She believed that many people were not happy with the budget  and it could lead to Gabungan Parti Sarawak (GPS) government to lose votes in the rural areas in the coming election.

“The Chinese community is not happy with the budget as there is no allocation for Chinese education in Sarawak. GPS government will have a price to pay in coming election,” she said in a press statement. Although it is impossible for the government to please everyone,  Tiew said the government should have at least sought the opinions of the people before releasing the budget.

“If the GPS government had sought the opinions of some stakeholders before the budget was drafted and tabled, it would have avoided a lot of criticisms against the GPS government by some quarters,’ she said.

On another matter, Tiew said the government has to take the blame for the decline of fish stock due to its past unsound policies of issuing licences to foreign trawlers to fish in our waters.

She said the poor catch by local fishermen due to depleted fish stock had made it necessary for the government to give out a monthly RM300 subsidy for them.

She said this is seen by many Dayaks as a race-motivated budget because most of the fishermen are from the Malay community.

“To these Dayaks, who are mostly from the rural areas, they are asking why such monthly allowance is given to the fishermen but nothing given to the farmers because farmers in the rural areas are also very poor.”

She said the natives are also not happy that only RM40 million was allocated for perimeter survey of the 52,000 hectares of Native Customary Rights (NCR) land.

“This is woefully inadequate. Again, it is doubtful that this amount of money would be spent in full for the job before the next budget. If the remaining allocated funds are not utilised, they would be returned to the State Treasury as the allocations could not be carried forward.”

She said the GPS government had also lost sight of the importance of lifting rural people out of poverty.

She said the first RM5 free monthly water bills sound nice for the urban dwellers but would not benefit people in the rural areas who do not have treated water supply.

“Each dry season, people in the rural areas are begging and crying for water and the government did no more than coming up with ‘Water Tank Policy,’” she added.

She contended that the RM40 million allocations for free water supply for the urban and rural areas could be put to a better use by providing water to rural schools.

Tiew said the GPS government’s plan to provide free school bus service to students in Kuching City benefits only people in the city..

“Although the government is seen as sympathetic to the poor students in urban areas who cannot provide transport to school, it had failed to understand that students in many rural areas have to walk miles and miles to schools.”