Monday, October 1, 2012

Alternative Budget Contradicts With Buku Jingga

The budget which was announced by Dato’ Seri Najib seems too concrete that Pakatan Rakyat has to keep on talking about it just so that they could find loopholes to raise doubt. PR also has to keep on questioning the Budget to divert rakyat's attention from the Empty Budget which they presented. Generally, the amount of both budgets does not have that much difference. The things that separate these two would be first, the scope. BN's Budget benefits all rakyat from OKU untuk corporate but PR's Budget only involves rakyat as a general. The second thing is that BN's planning clearly too the consideration on long-term effects by PR only focused on immediate effect. The third thing is that BN's Budget focuses on the wellbeing of rakyat and the country's development but PR only focuses on direct benefit to rakyat without even considering the effect which would cost the country's economy. Fourth, BN's Budget has never slipped or went against the national policy but PR's budget is more towards challenging it, and that it is not even consistent with their own Buku Jingga. Few of them include the abolishment of 20% of vehicle excise duty, free education and scraping off PTPTN. According to Suara PR, the reason why it is inconsistent with Buku Jingga is because all of the incentives are more of a long-term process when Buku Jingga is their 100 day deadline for them to fulfil all promises if Pakatan Rakyat claims Putrajaya. The website also confirmed that abolishing PTPTN would not happen in a blink of an eye but it might take two years, the same thing goes to abolishing tolls which was promised in Buku Jingga, would not be done instantly, but it is just 'immediate action' (within 100 days)to order Khazanah Berhad, Kumpulan Wang Simpanan Pekerja (KWSP) and other government linked companies (GLC) who own highway concessions to complete the highway asset transfer by the government in order to scrape off tolls. The answer which was given by PR regarding the clash between Alternative Budget with Buku Jingga showed that they do have the intention to confuse rakyat. To ensure that rakyat would not know about their 'twists', PR then made this rumor by saying that the budget which they present would allow rakyat to have additional income of RM930 monthly, resulting from all the costs which rakyat could save up which include RM70 for cars, RM50 from abolishing tolls, RM200 from abolishing PTPTN, special teaching allowance as promised by Buku Jingga (RM500), Government’s contribution to Caruman Wanita Nasional (RM50) and savings from lower food and goods prices due to lower fuel and transportation charges (RM60). We are certain that rakyat could not simply be fooled with this RM930 saving-scheme. Not all rakyat would be involved with PTPTN loans, and not all rakyat work as teachers where they would get RM500 allowance each month and not all rakyat use toll-ed roads, except for those who live in major cities. The fact is, majority of Malaysians live in kampungs and small towns. Thus, how could the scheme apply to them? Besides that, the RM70 which rakyat could 'save' from vehicle cost would not bring as much difference. Meanwhile, reducing price of fuel and food would depend on the global market, not on the hands of PR. But, lets say if PR government could really fulfill all of the above, rakyat might be happy, but it might just last for a while. This is because free education, abolishing PTPTN and tolls, reducing fuel, food price and vehicle excise duty would put this country into crisis within a few years of its implementation. Free education and abolishing tolls and PTPTN would mean that the government would have to coverall costs, hence, effecting the budget in order to fund other programs which could benefit rakyat. Other than bringing other effects such as bad quality students which then could lead to social issues. The same thing might go to highway maintenence. The vehicle excise duty would then cause vehicle industry to suffer increased production cost to maintain their operations and that could just kill the automobile industry in the near future. The fact is, rakyat could see that PR do not really look that far in planning their budget because their Alternative budget is merely an Election Budget. That is why everything which they presented was 'election friendly' instead of really providing huge long-term wellbeing both for rakyat and the country.

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