The Supply Bill or Budget 2021 for the Prime Minister’s Department (JPM) and the Ministry of Finance (MoF) was passed at the committee stage today through a bloc voting which saw over 100 MPs voted in favour of the bill, while 95 voted against it.
Unlike the policy stage voting for Budget 2021 last week, nearly all Opposition MPs had risen today when Dewan Rakyat Speaker Azhar Azizan Harun called for the division earlier. A minimum of 15 lawmakers must rise to trigger the division.
The budget for JPM was passed by 105 against 95 with 20 absent, while for the MoF, it was passed after 107 MPs voted for it, 95 against and 18 absent.
Missing from chambers on the government side were Najib Razak (Pekan-BN), Ahmad Zahid Hamidi (Bagan Datuk-BN), Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah (Gua Musang-BN) and Jeffrey Kitingan (Keningau-STAR).
From the opposition were Dr Mahathir Mohamad (Langkawi-Independent), Chow Kon Yeow (Tanjong-DAP), Masir Kujat (Sri Aman-PSB), Awang Husaini Sahari (Putatan-PKR), Michael Teo (Miri-PKR), Christina Liew (Tawau-PKR).
The eight Warisan MPs from Sabah were absent.
Two of the 222 seats in Dewan Rakyat are vacant following the deaths of Liew Vui Keong (Batu Sapi) and Hasbullah Osman (Gerik).
Prior to the announcement of the results, several Opposition lawmakers cried foul as a few government MPs, including Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Datuk Takiyuddin Hassan (Pas-Kota Baru), had entered the Dewan Rakyat while the votes were being counted.
Sepang MP Mohamed Hanipa Maidin, along with several other Opposition lawmakers, had even asked the Speaker of the House to kick out the aforementioned government lawmakers.
However, Datuk Seri Dr Shahidan Kassim (BN-Arau) stood up and said there was no time limit for bloc voting.
On paper, Perikatan Nasional (PN) has 112 MPs on its side v 108 in the opposition camp.
Given that the Perikatan Nasional (PN)-BN-GPS ruling alliance did not obtain 111 votes today, it was technically possible for them to be defeated.
However, what was clear was that opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim (Harapan-Port Dickson) – who has claimed since Sept 23 that he commanded a “strong, formidable and convincing” majority – was not able to muster a united opposition.
Earlier, 18 MPs debated the budget for JPM before the winding up by the respective ministers in the Prime Minister’s Department, while 10 other MPs participated in the debate on the budget for the MoF before the winding-up speech by Finance Minister Tengku Datuk Seri Zafrul Tengku Abdul Aziz.
Anwar opened the debate by querying the need for a bigger cabinet.
“Why is there a 10.7% or RM482 million increase for the Prime Minister’s Department during this time?” he asked.
“The Prime Minister’s Office now has 32 ministers and 38 deputies with a full list of media and economic advisers. It also has special envoys to China and the Middle East. What then is the role of the Foreign Affairs Ministry if we have to have more special envoys?”
He said there are overlapping functions between the Prime Minister’s Department with the Foreign Affairs Ministry.
Anwar also questioned the RM181 million allocation for contract staff.
“What has this additional RM181 million got to do with the Malaysians suffering and the front-liners battling the Covid-19 pandemic?”
Khalid Samad (Shah Alam-PH) and Teo Nie Ching (Kulai-PH) also questioned the prime minister’s motivations for raising the number of portfolios.
“Was the cabinet expanded for Prime Minister Muhyiddin to secure support for himself among the MPs?” asked Khalid, who was federal territories minister in the Pakatan Harapan government.
The allocation of more than RM2 billion in Budget 2021 for the Prime Minister’s Department for unclear purposes might be “slush funds” that could be used as the prime minister pleases, DAP MP Chong Chieng Jen claimed today.
Chong, who is Stampin MP and also Sarawak DAP chief, highlighted the “drastic” increase of the allocation for development expenditure under the Prime Minister’s Department from RM2.93 billion in 2020, to RM7.22 billion in 2021, which he said represented a jump of 146 percent.
“And if we look at it in detail, there exists a few items that we can categorise as slush funds, which are allocations without any specific purposes and subject to the whims and fancies of the prime minister alone,” he said.
Chong listed these allocations which he suggested could be considered as slush funds under the Prime Minister’s Department, before going on to accuse the Perikatan Nasional government of adopting alleged questionable practices under the past Barisan Nasional administration.
He listed these allocations as a development programme which was allocated RM159 million for 2020, but now has a RM520 million allocation for 2021; public, private partnership projects which had zero allocation for 2020 but now have an RM813 million allocation for 2021 while also questioning who the public-private partnerships are; “special projects” which were allocated only RM100 million for 2020 but are now allocated RM1 billion for 2021, as well as Projek Mesra Rakyat that had zero allocations for 2020 but now is allocated RM330 million for 2021.
Highlighting the RM1 billion allocation for “special projects” in particular, Chong asked: “What are special projects? Special for the prime minister to buy the support of MPs to maintain his power? Is that the special projects which were mentioned and meant?”
“Looks like the reforms that Pakatan Harapan did previously, which is devolution of powers from the prime minister, has been reversed by the government now. And the practice of ‘Cash is King’ and ‘concentration of power in the hands of the prime minister’ will be inherited from Pekan to Pagoh,” he claimed, referring to Pekan MP Datuk Seri Najib Razak who was the former prime minister heading the BN government and Pagoh MP Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin who is the current prime minister heading the Perikatan Nasional government.
Chong went on to highlight at the same time that the allocation under the Prime Minister’s Department for projects for the poor in peninsula Malaysia, Sabah, Sarawak has been reduced by 30 percent from RM90 million in Budget 2020 to RM63 million in Budget 2021, despite the increase in development expenditure for the Prime Minister’s Department as a whole.
“Are the welfare of the poor less important until projects for the poor have to be cut?” he questioned.
Like Chong, other MPs today had also questioned the budget allocation of RM1 billion for “special projects,” including Tuaran MP Datuk Seri Wilfred Madius Tangau and Kuantan MP Fuziah Salleh.
Datuk Seri Mustapa Mohamed, minister in the Prime Minister’s Department in charge of economy, then responded to the questions raised in the debate on the “special projects” allocation, telling Chong specifically that there are no such elements of slush funds.
Mustapa noted that the government had started allocating funds for special projects under the Prime Minister’s Department since 2012, and that such allocations were also made under the 11th Malaysia Plan with RM25 billion for such purposes.
“And next year it is RM1 billion, this is to tackle payments for urgent projects outside of the government’s planning, small projects that in general are high impact and citizen-friendly.
“Just now there were allegations of non-transparency, use of the word ‘slush funds’. I give the assurance that there is no such element,” he said.
Mustapa said the special funds allocation in 2019 was for example spent on projects for roads, education centres, community halls and houses of worship, while a big part of this allocation for 2020 is for Felda areas that the government had viewed as lacking allocations and that requests for funds from states such as Pahang, Sabah, and Negri Sembilan for Felda had been approved.
As for the RM813 million allocated in 2021 for public-private partnerships, Mustapa said this allocation is to pay rent on several government buildings.
“All this RM813 million is not a secret, there are around 10 projects that the government has to pay rent on, availability charges, availability payments, maintenance payments; such as paying rent for Parcel F, Putrajaya involving RM324 million and around 40 per cent of allocations next year is for this purpose,” he said of the proportion that Parcel F rental takes up of the RM813 million allocation.
The MPs who participated in the debate on the Finance Ministry allocation included Datuk Seri Saifuddin Nasution (Pakatan Harapan/PH – Kulim-Bandar Baharu); Datuk Seri Shahidan Kassim (Barisan Nasional – Arau); Datuk Seri Ahmad Maslan (BN – Pontian); Datuk Amiruddin Hamzah (Independent – Kubang Pasu); Datuk Jalaluddin Alias (BN – Jelebu); and Sim Tze Tzin (PH – Bayan Baru).
The ministry was allocated RM35.1 billion in the 2021 Budget comprising RM20.8 billion for administrative costs and RM14.1 billion for development expenditures.
The opposition today repeatedly taunted the government benches by vowing to challenge the allocations for each ministry until the final vote.
The debate, winding-up and voting of the budget at the committee stage will take place until Dec 15, with that involving Foreign Ministry, National Unity Ministry and the Plantation Industries and Commodities Ministry scheduled for tomorrow.
The Supply Bill 2021, which was tabled by Tengku Zafrul on Nov 6, was passed at the policy stage last Thursday through a majority voice vote after two weeks of debate and four-day winding up session.
The Dewan Rakyat sitting continues tomorrow.