Govt cancels targeted fuel subsidy programme
PARLIAMENT | The government has decided not to proceed with the targeted fuel subsidy programme (PSP) that was mooted by the previous Pakatan Harapan administration, Parliament heard today.
Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs Deputy Minister Rosol Wahid told Parliament that his ministry and the Ministry of Finance (MoF) have agreed not to implement the programme after considering the price difference of fuel between the peninsula and East Malaysia, among other factors.
“The decision was made on...
PARLIAMENT | The government has decided not to proceed with the targeted fuel subsidy programme that was mooted by the previous Pakatan Harapan administration, Parliament heard today.
Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs Deputy Minister Rosol Wahid said that his ministry and the Finance Ministry have agreed not to implement the Petrol Subsidy Programme (PSP) after considering the price difference of fuel between the peninsula and East Malaysia, among other factors.
“The decision was made on July 9 in a meeting between the ministry and the Finance Ministry due to several reasons.
“The reasons for not implementing the PSP are, first, to avoid misunderstanding among residents of Sabah, Sarawak and the Federal Territory of Labuan because only people in Peninsular Malaysia would be involved in this subsidy.
“And (second) to avoid creating a wide gap in petrol prices between Peninsular Malaysia, and Sabah, Sarawak and Labuan,” he told the Dewan Rakyat.
He was replying to a supplementary question from Shaharizukirnain Abd Kadir (Harapan-Setiu) on the government's plans on petrol subsidy.
The programme was first announced on Oct 7, 2019, by former minister Saifuddin Nasution who said that under the Budget 2020 presentation, the government had allocated RM2.2 billion for the scheme.
However, on Dec 18, 2019, the cabinet decided to indefinitely defer its implementation which had been scheduled to take off in January this year.
The decision to not proceed with the PSP was also to avoid creating doubts among the people on the transparency of the subsidy scheme, Rosol added.
He said one aspect which could give rise to such doubts was the fact that the M40 group would enjoy discounts when filling up their tanks using a petrol subsidy card.
The allocation was expected to benefit 8 million people in the B40 and M40 groups.
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