As we know that Sabah has recorded weak economic growth all this while because of the bad governance that practiced by UMNO-BN government. With this kind of low performance in governance, all developments planned that have been announced by the government will not be success and the people will still burdened with the implementation of Goods and Services Tax (GST).
To alleviate the burden of living cost that caused by GST, I would like to suggest that Sabah State Government to absorb the GST for local authorities and government service in the state. To follow after the step of other state governments that already announced the same policy: Penang, Sarawak, Terengganu and Johor.
I urge the Chief Minister Datuk Musa Aman to announce the absorbent of GST by the state government as fast as possible. If he is hesitating to make this announcement, this only show that he is not sincere in reducing the burden of people.
In my opinion, if the state government of Sabah truly understands, they should have to do so, since the budget of Sabah is among the highest in Malaysia, for example in 2015, Sabah had a sum of RM4.07 billion budget.
All this while, the people of Sabah is forced to bear the price hike such as the high water and electricity rate, and daily stuffs and foods that expensive. BN State government seems only “making huge profits” but the people are actually burdened by high living cost and basic infrastructure that is incomplete.
I believe that Sabah is able to bear the cost of the absorbent of GST since Sabah has plenty of resources such as oil and gas, timber, palm oil and so on so forth. And as what we have seen, other states that also rich in natural resources like Sarawak and Terengganu are also taking the initiative to absorb GST.
Penang is also proudly to announce to follow this step, as a state that without much resources and always being neglected by the Federal Government especially on the matter of federal allocation, it also agrees to absorb the GST in order to reduce the burden of people.
Besides that, because of the slowness in the economic growth of Sabah, it is not surprise that there are more and more young people in Sabah like those in Tawau, Sandakan and Kudat migrate to major cities in Malaysia like Kota Kinabalu, Kuala Lumpur, Georgetown, Johor Bahru as well as Singapore to seek for job opportunities and better life. Tawau, Sandakan and Kudat are slowly becoming the “old folk towns”.
What causes this phenomenon of immigration is the limitation of job opportunity and good education in Sabah because of weak economic growth under UMNO-BN governance. And this causes brain-drain that harm Sabah itself.
I would like to stress that BN government cannot simply treat Sabah as its fix-deposit state. Although Sabah handed the victory to BN in the last general election, it is not a license for BN to continue bully Sabah.
As the state that much neglected in terms of development and opportunity needs a double efforts to make sure that its welfare and development is at the same level with other states in Peninsular. Do not just feel proud with the “high allocation” as long as it cannot improve the economic status of people.