Chan asks for intervention measures to address lack of affordable housing

DAP Sri Tanjung assemblyman Chan Foong Hin has called on the relevant minister to explain what intervention measures are being taken by the State Government to address the lack of affordable housing in Sabah.

Chan said Bank Negara Malaysia, in its Malaysia Economic and Financial Development Report 2017 for third quarter, had pointed out that house prices in Sabah were severely unaffordable, with a median multiple of 5.5.

“Bank Negara states that Malaysia lacks 960,000 units of affordable homes, which is projected to reach one million units by 2020. Half of these shortfall are located in Sabah and Sarawak,” Chan highlighted.

Hence, he is calling on the relevant minister to explain how the State Government would intervene in addressing this issue, including ways to expedite the supply of affordable homes, reducing red tape in land application and development.

On another matter, Chan called on the State Government to rethink the strategy of the budget to incorporate more innovative elements.

Taking Sarawak as an example, he said our neighbouring state had allocated 70 percent (RM5.74 billion) for development and 30 percent (RM2.481 billion) for supply next year.

“I do not mean to infer that Sabah has to achieve this 70:30 ratio as our state reserves is only RM3 billion, not RM28 billion like Sarawak. However, we should formulate a budget with more balanced ratio so that the development expenditure can be increased,” Chan suggested.

Deputy Chief Minister Datuk Seri Panglima Raymond Tan Shu Kiah chided Chan as to why he is comparing the State Budget with Sarawak, instead of the DAPled Penang state government, which has tabled an unusual budget of RM1.2 billion despite an estimated revenue collection of RM500 million.

Nonetheless, Chan reckoned that the State Budget 2018 is an election budget, as shown by the 100 percent increase in Special Allocation from RM53 million in 2017 to RM115 million in 2018, which would involve 14 special programmes, including the increase in allocation for Sentuhan Kasih for Barisan Nasional (BN) assemblymen, from RM500,000 to RM800,000.

This means that BN assemblymen have more budget to be used in addition to their existing RM1 million allocation. He expressed the hope that the assemblymen would not spend all the allocation in three months as the funding was meant for the whole year.