KUALA LUMPUR – The government has announced its biggest ever budget on record for 2023, allocating a staggering RM372.3 billion for next year.
This is RM40.2 billion more than last year’s allocation of RM332.1 billion, which was then the biggest budget.
Finance Minister Datuk Seri Tengku Zafrul Tengku Abdul Aziz, in tabling the Supply Bill 2023, said a total of RM272.3 billion will be for operational expenditure, while RM95 billion will be for development.
A further RM5 billion will be allocated for the Covid-19 fund while RM2 billion is for contingency savings.
Tengku Zafrul said this year’s budget allocation took into account the economic uncertainty, which is set to affect countries globally.
Among others, he noted how the United States had aggressively tightened its monetary policy by increasing its interest rate by 300 basis points.
He said these recent developments have led to spiralling inflation in the country, which saw an increase of 4.7% in August compared with 2.3% in January.
However, Tengku Zafrul said that had it not been for the government’s intervention by providing RM77.7 billion in total subsidies, the inflation would have reached a whopping 10% by today.
“The global economic forecast has become increasingly uncertain and more challenging. As a country that practises an open economy, Malaysia cannot run away from the global spillover effects.”
In this regard, Zafrul said Malaysia is expected to see moderate growth of between 4% and 5% next year. – The Vibes, October 7, 2022
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