KOTA KINABALU: Sabah wants unused annual federal development funds allocated under the budget placed in a trust fund if the identified projects cannot be completed during the year.
State Finance Minister Datuk Seri Masidi Manjun said creating a trust fund would ensure that the money allocated for the year was used to complete the targeted projects instead of being carried forward to the next budget.
Masidi said federal annual allocations for development projects were not fully utilised due to bureaucracy, among other issues.
For example, he said, if the allocation for a particular year was RM5bil but only RM3bil could be implemented, then the same allocation was carried forward for the same project in the next budget for project completion.
“As such, there will be no new projects for the following year. But if we put that money into a development trust fund, whether the year has ended or not, it still can be used for the identified projects,” he said when met during the National Dual Skills System graduation ceremony here on Saturday.
Masidi said it was important for state and federal agencies to efficiently manage the development funds allocated for the targeted projects so that they could be completed within the same year.
But he said over the years, such annual allocations were not fully utilised.
Though he did not give statistics, some analysts have noted that Sabah managed to utilise only about 50% of its annual development allocation over the years.
Under Budget 2023, a total of RM6.5bil has been allocated to Sabah for development.
“As the state finance minister, I think it is more important to uphold the efficiency of government agencies at the federal and state levels in managing the funds,” said Masidi.
