The Man Who May Be Malaysia S Next Minister Of Finance Speaks Up On Threshold Bailout

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"Developers build too many high-end homes for the well-to-do"
KL, 241010: They sure don't make our national budgets like they used to. When the economy advisor to the Prime Minister starts taking jibes at his own Government's Budget 2020. you can only guess that not all the proposals in the Budget were thoroughly discussed with everybody that matters (if discussed at all!). And when a dirty word like "bail out" is used, you can't help wonder if someone who's part of the team that made the Budget was trying to smuggle some proposals which shouldn't be there. Dr Muhammed Abdul Khalid's quarrel with Lim Guan Eng's budget concerns the proposal by the Minister of Finance to lower the threshold for property prices for foreigners from RM1 million to a mere RM600k. Guan Eng's excuse: developers haven't been able to sell.  The idea became very contentious immediately, largely because developers have the bad reputation of making too much out of house buyers. So-called affordable homes have not been affordable for quite a while now due to greed, corruption and poor planning. The PM had, at first, defended the proposal but Housing Minister Zuraida Kamaruddin's disclosure that the "threshold" was Guan Eng's Ministry's idea and had nothing to do with her ministry led to suspicions. Because it was Zuraida, most people paid no heed.  But now the PM's Economic Advisor himself has spoken. And a lot of people tend to take the PM's Economic Advisor a lot more seriously. In fact, some people think Dr  Mo would make a better MOF than Guan Eng any day. I don't necessarily subscribe to that thought, of course. 
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