Wong’s answer on ‘missing funds’ raises more questions – Chong

KUCHING: Second Finance Minister Dato Sri Wong Soon Koh’s answer on the “missing RM250 million MRP (Minor Rural Project) Fund” has raised more questions than answer on the subject, says Kota Sentosa assemblyman Chong Chieng Jen.

Chong, who is state DAP chairman, quoted Wong as saying during his ministerial winding up speech at the recently concluded State Legislative Assembly (DUN) sitting that in respect of the approved RM905.9 million MRP Fund allocation, “at the closing of 2015 account, an amount of RM572.8 million was spent while the unutilised allocation of RM333.1 million has, in fact, remained intact in the Consolidated Fund”.

“From this one answer from Wong Soon Koh, there are five more questions for him to answer. His answer is in direct contradiction with the Chief Minister and Finance Minister I’s (Datuk Patinggi Tan Sri Adenan Satem) answer on the approved allocation for MRP fund in year 2015.

“The full text of the Chief Minister’s answer given in October, 2016 is as follows: ‘For the information of Ahli Yang Berhormat for Kota Sentosa, the total allocation approved for Minor Rural Projects in 2015 was RM655.9 million to implement 11,878 projects in the State. Of these projects, 11,465 have been completed. The remaining 413 are still under various stages of implementation and scheduled for completion in 2016.’

“From Wong Soon Koh’s answer, he confirms that the total approved allocation for MRP fund in 2015 is RM905.9 million. Why is there such a discrepancy in the ‘approved allocation for MRP fund’ in the sum of RM250 million between the answers given by the Finance Minister II (Wong Soon Koh) and Finance Minister I (Chief Minister)? Was Adenan trying to hide something?” Chong questioned during a press conference here yesterday.

The Bandar Kuching MP said if Wong’s answer was correct, then, out of the total approved RM905.9 million MRP fund in year 2015, a large sum of RM333.1 million remained unutilised.

“That is 36.8 per cent of the approved fund not utilised and it is a highly inefficient rate of implementation of projects and budgetary allocations by the Sarawak State Government. Is this 36.8 per cent rate of unutilised approved fund the general rate across the board for the State Government’s budget? If it were the case, then for every announced allocation of RM1 billion, only RM632 million of the fund will be used by the end of the year.

“Adenan/Wong Soon Koh must give the people of Sarawak a full account of the utilisation rates of all the approved allocation and explain for their inefficiency.”