PUTRAJAYA: Sabah Pakatan Harapan (PH) chairman Datuk Mustapha Sakmud (pic) has challenged Opposition Leader in the Dewan Rakyat Datuk Seri Hamzah Zainudin to present a credible alternative budget showing how to reduce the national fiscal deficit without compromising development allocations for Sabah and Sarawak.
Mustapha said criticising Budget 2027 was insufficient without concrete proposals on managing public finances while sustaining investment in infrastructure, education, healthcare and economic opportunities, responding to Hamzah’s claim that using strategic national institutions, including Petronas and KWAP, to support the government’s development agenda amounted to “slaughtering the goose that lays the golden eggs”.
The Sepanggar MP said the fiscal deficit had declined from five per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) in 2023 to 4.1 per cent in 2024 and 3.7 per cent in 2025, and was projected to fall further to 3.6 per cent in 2026 and 3.3 per cent in 2027, compared with 6.4 per cent in 2021 and 5.5 per cent in 2022.
He said federal government borrowings had also fallen from about RM100 billion annually in 2021 and 2022 to RM75.6 billion in 2025, while Budget 2027 allocated a combined RM34.9 billion to Sabah and Sarawak, comprising RM18.7 billion for Sabah and RM16.2 billion for Sarawak, RM2.2 billion more than the previous year and the highest combined allocation for the two states.
Mustapha, who is also Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department (Sabah and Sarawak), said the figures showed that fiscal consolidation could reduce the debt burden on future generations without sacrificing development, despite geopolitical tensions, global economic uncertainty and pressure from fuel subsidies, and urged the opposition to explain how it would balance fiscal discipline with Sabah and Sarawak’s development needs.
