Sabah’s development took a toll under Warisan, says Najib

(FMT) – Former prime minister Najib Razak today said Sabah’s economy suffered under the Warisan-led government and had developed more under the previous Barisan Nasional (BN) administration.

In a Facebook post, he said economic growth in Sabah was higher compared with the whole country in the eight years that BN had ruled the state before the 14th general election.

”For example, in 2017, Sabah’s GDP was 8.2%, which was the highest among all states and even higher than the 5.9% GDP for the whole of Malaysia.

“In 2016, Sabah recorded a growth of 4.7% compared with 4.2% for Malaysia,” he said.

However, Najib claimed that in 2018, Sabah‘s GDP fell to an all-time low of 1.5%, the lowest among all the states.

He accused the Pakatan Harapan (PH) federal government and the Warisan-led state government of not launching or implementing strategic plans for Sabah’s development.

Instead, he said, the state government had put in place other infrastructure projects given to companies through direct negotiations.

“Existing projects were either discontinued or delayed, such as the Pan Borneo Sabah Highway project, while help for Sabahans was also reduced.

“Meanwhile, new projects (were started) under Warisan, such as the RM3 billion Papar Dam, which was given to the Penang tunnel company’s cronies based in the peninsula.

“The RM1.5 billion Sabah road maintenance project was given to five companies through direct negotiations including one company (allegedly) associated with the corruption scandal involving Sabah minister Peter Anthony.

“These are the reasons why economic growth was slow under Warisan,” he said.