Petaling Jaya city council (MBPJ) has denied all claims that they had spent an exorbitant amount of money on the waste management budget in 2012.
 
PJ deputy mayor Puasa Md Taib told reporters after the 2015 draft budget presentation session that the alleged waste management expenditure of more than RM300 million is false.
 
“We deny all claims. It's not possible for the figures to be that high when our total budget for PJ is only RM268.8 million in 2012.
 
“The 2012-2013 budget report has already been audited and verified by the auditor-general (AG),” Puasa said.
 
He was referring to the claims by former MBPJ councillor Mak Khuin Weng that MBPJ had, in 2012 racked up RM365 million more that the RM52 million allocated for the supply and services budget.
 
Mak had alleged in a 2014 “councillor's budget report”, which he claim is only released to councillors, showed that the total expenditure in 2012 was RM629 million, with the said rubbish disposal services expenditure being the dominant one.
 
“If you look at the estimated waste management budget for 2014, the figures are RM55.3 million. Even our projected budget for 2015 is RM56 million.
 
“There is no way we racked up RM417 million just for waste management. The claims are false,” he reiterated.
 
Puasa also denied claims that there exist a budget report separately filed for councillors.
 
“There's only one type of yearly report, and they are all available on our website. We do not provide any sort of double standard budget reports.
 
“We are very clear and honest with the people of PJ,” he added.
 
MBPJ public relations director Haniza Haji Abd Hamid added that waste concessionaire Alam Flora Sdn Bhd was given more than RM60.3 million to keep PJ clean when they were control.
 
However, in late 2011, Alam Flora's contract was terminated and MBPJ then took over from them.
 
“After we took over, the budget expenditure was reduced from RM60.3 million to RM50.4 million in 2012,” said Haniza citing the certificates given by the AG on the 2011, 2012, 2013 MBPJ financial statements.
 
Yesterday, a coalition of NGOs and resident associations, Coalition of Good Governance (CGG) in a press conference had urged MBPJ in their discussion today to include participative budgeting, which focuses on the inclusion of residents.
 
“Apart from that, we must have a budget monitoring committee. It was passed by the council under former mayor Mohammad Roslan Sakiman but was not implemented.
 
“With a committee, we can get clarification of the actual spendings against the budgeted amounts,” said Jeffrey Phang from Friends of Kota Damansara.