Abd Karim gets support of S’wak leaders in spat with Lim on tourism tax

KUCHING: Sarawakian leaders came forward to defend Minister of Tourism, Arts, Culture, Youth and Sports Datuk Abdul Karim Rahman Hamzah for raising his concern about the tourism tax which did not go down well with the federal Minister of Finance (MOF) Lim Guan Eng.

"Our minister (Abdul Karim) was merely raising a valid concern about Tourism Tax owed to Sarawak. Shockingly, the response from the Federal Minister of Finance (Lim) sounds edgy or rather berserk," said Assistant Minister of Corporate Affairs Abdullah Saidol in a press statement.

"It should be noted that it was an official written press statement from the Ministry of Finance and signed by the minister. It was bizarre to read a written ministerial response with such agitated tone," Abdullah added.

"Which state in this country that doesn't secure federal loan?"

For the record, in accordance with the terms of arrangement with the federal government, Sarawak did not default on any repayment, said Abdullah.

Lambasting Lim further, he said as the Finance Minister and former Chief Minister of Penang, Lim should have known better this usual financial arrangement between the state and federal governments.

Being a federal Minister now, he should have shown his levelheaded attitude by specifically addressing the issue raised instead of emotionally straying into other matters, he added.

"Minister of Finance is also a member of the Federal Steering Committee on the Malaysian Agreement (MA63), who questioned Sarawak's constitutional right to impose five per cent Sales Tax on petroleum products. Sarawak Pakatan Harapan (PH) representatives seem to be speechless when MOF said the imposing of that five per cent tax was not appropriate," said Abdullah, who is also chief political secretary to the chief minister.

"Sarawak people still remember what he pledged about giving 20 per cent royalties and returning 50 per cent of all tax collected from Sabah and Sarawak," he added.

"At the same time, we Sarawakians either sympathise with the Minister of Works (Selangau MP Baru Bian) or are frustrated with the MOF for not being able to provide funding either to maintain federal roads or build the desired bridges in Sarawak," he pointed out.

As a result, he said Sarawak GPS government ended up taking the initiative to finance the construction of three bridges.

And till now the federal government had failed to commit seriously to their obligation to address the issue of dilapidated schools in Sarawak, Abdullah pointed out.

On Dec 31 last year, it was reported in a national paper that Lim said the country's economic indicators were encouraging, pointing out that Malaysia's FDI increased by 250 per cent to RM49 billion.