KUCHING, Feb 25 — Deputy Premier of Sarawak Datuk Seri Dr Sim Kui Hian has expressed mixed feelings about Budget 2023 provisions for Sarawak.
While he welcomed the budget, he indicated that it might be too soon to determine how it would fully benefit the state.
“The devil is in the details. For example, how much budget allocation for the ongoing projects and how much is truly on the new projects,” said Dr Sim who is also Sarawak’s Minister for Public Health, Housing and Local Government.
As for the funding under Article 112D of the Federal Constitution, he said that though the formula for the special annual grant to Sarawak and Sabah was still being finalised, the RM300 million was a good start compared to the Pakatan Harapan (PH) government in 2019 which offered Sarawak only RM40 million.
“Fortunately, the Gabungan Parti Sarawak (GPS) government back then, despite the cheap publicity of PH politicians against the GPS government, stood up for Sarawak,” said Dr Sim.
Prime Minister and Minister of Finance, Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, when tabling the 2023 Budget in parliament yesterday, said the federal government had allocated RM5.6 billion in development for Sarawak, increased the annual special grant from RM16 million to RM300 million, and expressed the federal government’s commitment speed up implementation of the Pan Borneo Highway.
He also announced that the federal government had allocated RM1 billion to develop border towns such as Kalabakan, Sabah and Ba Kelalan to connect with Indonesia’s new capital Nusantara under the budget. — Borneo Post Online
