PETALING JAYA, Jan 28 – The Malaysian economy is very stable and among the contributing factors is the implementation of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) in April last year, said Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak, who is also the Finance Minister.
Najib said the Customs Department had collected more than RM51 billion in revenue since the implementation of the GST, compared with a collection of RM37.2 billion in 2014 without the GST. He described the additional collection as oxtraordinary and higher than the original projection which enabled the government to face the economic uncertainty in the world economy currently.
Speaking at the 34th World Customs Day celebration, here Thursday, Najib said the government was still able to provide various other facilities including scholarships and other assistance such as the 1Malaysia People’s Aid (BR1M) despite the drop in the price of world crude oil currently.
“GST does not burden the people, on the contrary the GST is savior of the people. With the drop of crude oil to around US30 per barrel, Malaysia is still able to retain all the civil servants, we did not terminate the services of anyone including those appointed on contract,” he said.
