PUTRAJAYA, Jan 28 — The government would not cancel or cut the costs of its projects, whether high-impact or not, under the recalibrated Budget 2016 announced by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak Thursday.
Treasury’s Secretary-General, Tan Sri Mohd Irwan Serigar Abdullah, said under the recalibration, the government would only re-arrange the cash flow timeline for the less-impact projects.
“No projects are being cut. What we do is we prioritise (the projects). If they don’t need the money quickly, we will try to re-arrange the cash flow.
“Also, projects where they want to purchase land only and would not even construct the building in the next two to three years, we’ll re-adjust the time on when we can start them,” he told reporters after the forum on ‘2016 Budget Recalibration’ here.
However, Mohd Irwan said, certain projects, including schools, hospitals, roads and electricity supply, would go ahead as planned.
Mohd Irwan was one of the speakers at the forum.
Others included Minister in the Prime Minister Department Datuk Seri Abdul Wahid Omar and Bank Negara Malaysia’s Governor Tan Sri Dr Zeti Akhtar Aziz.
Earlier, Wahid said, the negotiations on the Kuala Lumpur-Singapore High-Speed Rail (HSR) project were ongoing.
“The HSR (project) will be continued. We are now negotiating with our Singaporean counterparts in terms of finalising the operating structure.
“In terms of the timing of the implementation (for the project), it will be shifted based on the final decision on the operating structure,” he said.
After the deal on the operating structure, Wahid said, the government needed to look at other technical details before the actual tendering could be called.
At budget recalibration announcement, Najib said, the development focus would be on projects and programmes that were rakyat-centric, has high multiplier effect and has low import contents.
“The implementation of non-physical projects and those that are still under study will be rescheduled,” he said.
Najib said these measures were expected to involve a reduction in cash flow commitments of up to RM5 billion, without affecting the economy and the people.
