Kuala Lumpur: Deputy Minister of Finance, Datuk Seri Ahmad Maslan in his 2023 Budget Wrap-up speech agreed to provide a written response over how much the Federal Government actually collected from Sabah in tax revenue last year.
Datuk Seri Wilfred Madius Tangau (pic) (PH- Tuaran) said the question had been asked many times but never entertained verbally or in writing in the past.
“I have been in this August House for five terms and whenever this matter is asked, the question is never answered and everyone avoids it.
“If so, I consider the agencies involved that should be able to provide information to relevant ministers such as the Auditor General, Department of Statistics, and Accountant General to have failed.
“That’s why in this debate, I want to ask the Minister again, state how much the actual revenue is each year. And to simplify the answer, give the amount of revenue collected in 2022,” he stressed.
Madius said he was ready to receive the answer in writing.
“The answer should be stated according to the details of each matter, whether in the form of taxes, dividends, levies or in the form of anything collected by the federal government from Sabah.
“For information, there is assumption that the total revenue collection from Sabah is RM30 billion. If this is true, 40 per cent of this collection is RM12 billion.
“If this RM12 billion was given to Sabah every year as stipulated in the 1963 Malaysia Agreement, Sabah would have received more than RM10 billion in revenue until today.
“I am very confident that with this RM10 billion, many infrastructure and infrastructure problems in Sabah can be solved,” said the Honorary President of the United Kinabalu Organization (Upko) again.
