Prime minister Najib Abdul Razak has been urged to include the oil and gas royalty payment for Kelantan in Budget 2013.

 

Gabungan Professional Tuntut Royalti, Pendaratan Minyak dan Gas ke Negeri Kelantan (Royalti), a coalition of 58 NGOs, said if the prime minister failed to meet their demand, they would send a convoy to Putrajaya to air their grouses.

 

Royalti president Nazri Deraman said the coalition was set up to claim the state’s oil royalty as stipulated under the Petroleum Development Act 1974 and the agreement between Kelantan and Petronas on May 9, 1975.

 

“We hope prime minister will announce the royalty payment in the upcoming budget. We will embark on a convoy to the Federal Court in Putrajaya on Oct 2, 3 and 4 to pledge our support for a fair distribution of oil royalty to Kelantan,” he said at the Parliament lobby yesterday.

 

Machang MP Saifuddin Nasution, who was present at the press conference, said Royalti’s demands are legitimate. He said the pressure group also planned to hand Najib a petition over the Kelantan oil royalty issue carrying 150,000 signatures on Oct 3.

 

The planned convoy is to coincide with the trial days of the suit by Kelantan government against Petronas.

 

On Aug 30, 2010, the Kelantan government filed a breach of contract and constitutional suit against Petronas for failing to pay royalty for oil and gas extracted within its territory including the overlapping areas with Terengganu, Thailand and Vietnam which have seen joint development deals with the federal government.

 

“We also want a response from the PM regarding a memorandum, dated Aug 7,” Saifuddin said.

 

On April 26, the Kelantan government was denied by the Court of Appeal details of Petronas’ oil royalty payments to Terengganu and other states to back its argument over the annual RM800 million payment from the federal government.

 

Najib had said that based on the law, Kelantan was not eligible to demand the cash payments from petroleum revenue saying that currently no petroleum production was carried out within Kelantan territorial waters.

- The Malay Mail

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