Budget revision will further spur devt in Sabah: Shareda
Published on: Thursday, January 22, 2015
Kota Kinabalu: Local builders have lauded the revised 2015 Budget announced on Tuesday, saying several initiatives would further spur development in the State. Sabah Housing and Real Estate Developers Association President Datuk Francis Goh (pic) said the Government's move to give more opportunities to local contractors to get contracts will generate a positive turnover to local builders. He pointed out that the spillover of an active construction sector alone would be enough to keep up to 155 other industries going.
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"This would thus generate a positive economic spin-off," he told the Daily Express, here. Goh also viewed positively the Government's decision to postpone power tariff hikes and scheduled gas price hikes in the hope that measures would be taken to reduce builders' higher capital contribution cost. He said builders had to fork out RM3,000 as capital contribution cost for Sabah Electricity Sdn Bhd to install power connections unto every unit inside a development. This amount, Goh said, was higher than what their peninsula are paying while the utility firm is also making a profit from the monthly charges from household consumers who purchased homes.
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"The peninsula developers are only paying RM450 as capital contribution cost and last year alone SESB may have churned up to RM20 million from a development of a mall."We estimated that in 2013 they could have earned around RM120 million in capital contribution," he said.
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On the decision to review the foreign worker levy, Goh suggested the Government develop a mechanism to stop workers from being pinched by competitors. Stay up-to-date by following Daily Express’s Telegram channel.
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