Amend Budget 2021 or else dissolve Parliament
Once this additional RM300 billion (EPF withdrawals, 6-month loan moratoriums, money for Chinese schools, money for Indians, money for SMEs-SMIs, money for M40, etc.) has been added to the original RM322 billion Budget, Barisan Nasional and Pakatan Harapan will support Budget 2021 and Muhyiddin will not need to dissolve Parliament to make way for GE15.
NO HOLDS BARRED
Raja Petra Kamarudin
Barisan Nasional and Pakatan Harapan want the government to amend or improve Budget 2021 if they want it approved by Parliament. If not, then the majority of the 222 Members of Parliament are going to vote against the Budget.
According to Lokman Adam in his Facebook video broadcast last night, they want Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin to resign — hence they are going to reject Budget 2021 to force his resignation.
Lokman explained in his nightly video broadcasts over the last few months that he is angry with Muhyiddin for refusing to drop the court cases against Najib Tun Razak and a number of Umno leaders after taking office on 1st March 2020. In fact, the opposite happened, they secured a conviction against Najib.
Lokman is angry that the court cases against Najib and the Umno leaders have not been dropped
According to Umno insiders, the judge who is going after Najib and the other Umno leaders is anti-Umno and pro-Pakatan Harapan. Hence, he is biased and is ruling based on political considerations.
What Lokman and a number of other Umno activists-bloggers want is for Muhyiddin to instruct the Attorney-General — who Lokman said is a Mahathir appointee — to withdraw the charges against Najib and all the other Umno leaders.
This may legally not be possible but what can happen is for the judge who is going to hear the appeals to be ordered to allow Najib, Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, and all those Umno leaders who are found guilty, to win their appeal and go free.
Alternatively, they can do an Anwar Ibrahim-type backdoor move by asking Seri Paduka Baginda Yang di-Pertuan Agong to grant pardons to all convicted Umno leaders. If that can be done, then the Umno activists-bloggers will stop attacking Muhyiddin and will stop demanding his resignation.
Muhyiddin will need to save the Umno leaders to save himself
Anyway, if Muhyiddin cannot assure Umno that he will kill all the court cases against the Umno leaders, then the alternative would be to amend Budget 2021 to include a six-month moratorium on loan repayments plus allow each Malaysian to withdraw RM10,000 from his or her EPF savings.
EPF has about 14 million subscribers and more than RM800 billion in assets. If each person takes out RM10,000 that will come to a total of RM140 billion. Maybe EPF will not have RM140 billion in cash, as most of their RM800 billion assets are invested in stocks and shares.
What EPF will have to do then is to sell off all these stocks and shares (say RM200 billion worth) and use RM140 billion of the cash to pay off 14 million Malaysians. (There will still be RM60 billion in cash balance).
This, of course, will cause the stock market to collapse — so EPF will have to do it quickly before the share prices collapse. Once the share prices collapse to less than half the current value, EPF can go in and buy back all these shares again at half the price or less (with the RM60 billion cash they still have).
Finance Minister Tengku Zafrul Aziz will need to double Budget 2021 to RM622 billion if he wants it approved by Parliament
So EPF gets to both eat their cake and keep it at the same time. 14 million Malaysians receive RM140 billion and EPF gets to buy back all their shares at a far cheaper price.
No doubt every time there is a winner in the stock market, there will also be losers. But that is not EPF’s or Muhyiddin’s problem. What is important is RM140 billion is paid out to help Malaysians who need financial aid.
Regarding the six months moratorium on loans, that is actually quite straightforward. Banks are profit-motivated and only want to make money. That is why banks lend money to people who have money and not to people who are penniless. Even Bank Islam will not lend money to people who are desperate for money, as they, too, are motivated by profit.
So, if the government can compensate the banks for their losses, then they will be happy to even give one-year moratorium. Of course, then the issue of where the government is going to find the billions needed to compensate the banks will crop up. Some of the development that has been planned will then need to be dropped — whether it is schools, hospitals, roads, bridges, tunnels, etc., will need to be looked into.
Of course, Budget 2021 needs to be amended to also include a few billion funds for Chinese schools — the demand from DAP. Then the Indians have also demanded money from the government since Hindraf has not yet received the trillions of Ringgit they are claiming from the British government as compensation for abandoning the Indians in Malaya in 1957.
Oh, and the SMEs or SMIs and M40 group have also demanded money. They have not indicated how much that is going to come to but let us just assume it is another RM100 billion or so.
Once this additional RM300 billion (EPF withdrawals, 6-month loan moratoriums, money for Chinese schools, money for Indians, money for SMEs-SMIs, money for M40, etc.) has been added to the original RM322 billion Budget, Barisan Nasional and Pakatan Harapan will support Budget 2021 and Muhyiddin will not need to dissolve Parliament to make way for GE15.
