Penang Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng today said his government's fiscal policies have managed to increase the state accumulated funds by RM178.45 million, an increase of 21 percent from RM847.45 million in 2007 to RM1.25 billion last year.

dap 2010 budget rocket cafe 071009 lim guan eng 01 Referring to the Auditor-General's 2008 Report, Lim said the record achievement of surpassing the billion-ringgit mark was historic.

"For the first time, the state has crossed the billion ringgit mark," he told newsmen after launching the Penang Economic Monthly magazine in G-Hotel, George Town today.

Under the previous Barisan Nasional state government, the accumulated funds were at RM847.45 for 2007.

Lim's Pakatan Rakyat government took over the reins from BN after the March general election last year.

The accumulated funds comprised the revenue accounts, trust fund accounts and loan accounts.

The report disclosed the accumulated revenue accounts showed an increase of RM88.02 million over the RM373.59 million in 2007 to last year's RM461.61 million.

The accumulated trust fund accounts showed a RM90.43 million rise from RM473.86 million in 2007 to RM564.29 million last year.

Money deposited in interest-bearing accounts

No transaction was shown in the report in the accumulated loan accounts.

The state government's cash in hand has also decreased from RM2.89 million to RM5.36 million during the corresponding period.

Lim explained that this was due to the increase in the state government's fixed deposit funds as it cannot get any interests from current accounts.

"We only kept cash in hand according to our monthly expenditure while the rest was kept in fixed deposits.

"It was our money-make-money policy that managed to increase our financial strength," Lim said.

He also applauded the four-star status given to the Penang Development Corporation (PDC) and state treasury department in the A-G's Report for financial management achievement in surpassing the 90 point mark.

In the report's section on financial management achievement based on accountability index of state departments and agencies, the PDC got 92.9-marks followed by the treasury department at 91.6.

He hopes other departments and agencies would emulate the PDC's achievement in the next report.