By Ling Hui
KUCHING, Nov 25: The surplus 2021 Budget that was tabled by the Sarawak government and passed in the august House in 2020 turns out to be a deficit budget with the state expenditure exceeding its revenue.
Padungan assemblyman Chong Chieng Jen raised this issue in today’s Sarawak Legislative Assembly (DUN) sitting at the DUN complex here.
He pointed out that when the Sarawak government estimated a revenue of RM10.01 billion for the year 2021, the actual revenue received was RM7.6 billion, almost RM3 billion short.
“If you look at the operating expenditure, the actual amount for 2021 was RM5.87 billion, but the estimated operating expenditure was RM3.8 billion. There is an excess of about RM2 billion there.
“And for the development expenditure, when it was estimated RM6.3 billion, the figure here shows that the actual amount spent was only RM5.3 billion.
“Meaning to say the amount approved by this ‘dewan’ was not fully spent but the operating expenditure was overspent by RM2 billion,” Chong pointed out.
He was referring to the finalised figures for year 2021 which were included in the 2023 Budget that was tabled this week, as compared with the 2021 Budget tabled on Nov 9, 2020.
“In light of such a huge difference between the actual and estimated amounts, I would like to seek clarification from the administration on the figures,” he said when debating on the Supply (2023) Bill, 2022.
In a press conference at the sideline of the DUN sitting, Chong said he had raised this issue because past budgets were often omitted in a budget debate while the assemblyman and assemblywoman would usually focus on the budget for the following year.
Meanwhile, Chong’s debate earlier was interrupted by Deputy Speaker Datuk Idris Buang who suggested the former to use the term “variance” instead of “discrepancy” to describe the differences between an estimated and actual amount.
After some light bickering, Chong eventually compromised and used the word “differences” in his debate. — DayakDaily
