Malaysia’s Finance Minister must be from Petaling Street?
By : Anti-Wayang
Our Finance Minister LGE continues with practise of inflating cost and then claiming to reduce the cost by 50% so that he can be seen as a hero.
He recently did this when he said there are parties who can “halve the cost” of the RM110b cost for HSR. https://ttkm.com.my/2018/07/11/rm110-billion-hsr/
It was LGE who claimed the cost of HSR to be RM110b despite the cost of the joint Malaysia-Singapore project was estimated to cost RM50-70b.
He also apparently doubled our national debt to more than RM1 trillion despite the official debt (and confirmed by the credit rating agencies) being RM680b.
Today he also doing the same with the LRT3 project.
The LRT3 project was originally awarded at a RM9b cost by the Najib govt in 2015.
A few days ago, news reports suddenly came out citing an “anonymous source” as saying that the LRT3 cost had increased from RM9b to RM15b due to additional requirements for new stations and design changes.
https://www.thestar.com.my/business/business-news/2018/07/10/lrt3-cost-can-be-reduced-by-rm6bil/
Two days ago, Guan Eng then claimed the LRT3 project now cost RM31.45b.
https://www.thestar.com.my/business/business-news/2018/07/10/prasarana-told-to-review-lrt3-cost/
And then today, Guan Eng heroically claimed that the LRT3 project can continue as he has halved the cost of the project from RM31.45b to RM16.63b!
https://www.thestar.com.my/business/business-news/2018/07/12/final-price-of-lrt3-reduced-by-47pct-to-rm16pt63b-says-prasarana/
What a hero our Finance Minister is!
But RM16.63b is still higher than the increased amount of RM15b claimed by the “anonymous source” a few days ago and the RM9b original cost!
So, what reductions are we talking about here? This practise is like what he did when he was Penang CM when in 2015, he increased property assessment rates by 16% then in 2017, he gave a 6% discount claiming that he wanted to ease the burden of GST for the people (even though assessment rates are not subject to GST).
This kind of ploy is exactly the same as those merchants in Petaling Street who doubles the price of the fake Rolex and then allows you to haggle the price down by 50% so you feel happy that you got a good deal – even though you were actually screwed. -TTKM-
(Artikel ini merupakan pandangan peribadi penulis dan tidak semestinya mencerminkan pendirian TTKM. – Editor TTKM )