Law for equal constituency funding needs bilateral support, Anthony Loke says
PETALING JAYA, July 11 — DAP secretary-general Anthony Loke said a law mandating the equal allocation of development funds for every constituency would need the backing of all parties.
The Seremban MP said he personally would back such a law as he had felt the sting of the unequal allocations during his stint in the Opposition.
“I’m all for it if you want to legislate it as an institutional allocation for all. That is something that I would definitely agree to.
“But as you know, the government is not decided by DAP,” he said at the “Political Stability in Hung Parliament” Forum at Sunway University this evening.
He said that the allocation should be given across the board in order to be fair to constituents.
It was common for constituents to ask for funds from their MPs, he said.
He gave the example of a parent-teacher association asking for funds from their MP to repair school toilets.
“If you are an MP, you are the leader of a constituency.
“If you can’t even repair the toilets of the schools, then what reform do you want to talk about?” he said without identifying the constituency.
In January, Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim announced that the annual development allocation for backbencher MPs have been slashed as the country’s economy was still recovering.
This led to Perikatan Nasional (PN) parliamentary whip Datuk Seri Takiyuddin Hassan pressing Anwar to guarantee equal allocations for Opposition lawmakers, saying this was contained in the Pakatan Harapan election manifesto.
