'I stand by what I said': PM on Muhyiddin's Felda debt jibe

Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim remains firm on his claims that former prime minister Muhyiddin Yassin never implemented his move to waive RM8.3 billion worth of Felda settlers’ loans.

Anwar concurred that there was an agreement to waive the debts of Felda settlers but the allocation was not tabled in the 2021 and 2022 national budgets.

The Pakatan Harapan chairperson said he only approved the waiver at the end of last month.

“There was an agreement, but in the 2021 and 2022 budgets, there was no allocation to settle and waive Felda settlers’ debts. I stand by this record.

“Only in the Madani budget for 2023 I provided an early allocation of RM990 million to waive Felda settlers’ debts of RM8.3 billion,” he said at a ‘Temu Anwar’ event in Kedah today.

Earlier, Muhyiddin slammed Anwar for “lying” about his efforts to waive Felda settlers’ debts.

In a statement, the Pagoh MP said the debt waiver was carried out during his time as prime minister.

“This was confirmed by the minister in the Prime Minister's Department in a parliamentary written reply on Feb 23, which said the waiver was done in 2021.

“However, due to cash flow issues in Felda, the Harapan-BN government could not continue carrying out the debt waiver initiative,” he said.

Muhyiddin, the Bersatu president, cited a statement by then Felda chairperson Idris Jusoh on Feb 24 this year that the waiver of Felda settlers’ loans worth some RM8.3 billion in 2021 had a significant impact on Felda’s cash flow.

The Finance Ministry on June 28 announced that an agreement with a government guarantee was signed for Felda to restructure the agency's loan through the issuance of Sukuk and revolving credit as part of efforts to restore Felda's financial position.

The government guarantee was signed by Anwar, who is also the Finance Minister.

The ministry said that a major part of the restructuring was to reduce the principal of its debt to financial institutions by RM7.9 billion.

It added that the restructuring will also reduce Felda's financial cost terms of interest rates and enable Felda to cancel 80 percent of the RM8.3 billion settler's debt implemented in 2021.

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