Thread by @imokman

Time to tweet out some of my past media statements on the budget and govt debt to set the context on how much 'cleaning up' we need to do with regards to the govt's balance sheet.

The most recent statement shows how much of debt repayment is 'hidden' in payments other than debt servicing including the infamous Pembinaan PFI. ongkianming.com/2018/01/09/mal…

For those who can't remember, Pembinaan PFI was actually a 'creative' way for the govt to hide DEVEX so that its borrowings won't appear as official govt debt: ongkianming.com/2014/11/18/med…

Pembinaan PFI is a 100% MOF owned entity which has more than RM20b in debt. But this debt does not appear as official govt debt or govt guarantees (contingent liability). It would have been 'hidden' if not for the Auditor General's report in 2015: ongkianming.com/2015/03/11/med…

I listed down 10 questions for the then Treasury Sec Gen Tan Sri Irwan to answer. Needless to say, his answers to the PAC were not very convincing.
ongkianming.com/2015/03/17/med…

These are some snippets of TS Irwan's answers to the PAC on Pembinaan PFI & why I thought they were unconvincing: ongkianming.com/2015/06/18/med…

These are two of my media statements highlighting some of the hidden details in the budget to look out for: ongkianming.com/2015/10/23/pre… and ongkianming.com/2016/10/22/pre…

In Feb, I published a report under @PenangInstitute together with Darshan Joshi looking at the 'slush funds' in the PMO's DEVEX and how some of these should be cut: ongkianming.com/2018/02/21/med…

The full report on the Jabatan Perdana Menteri's DEVEX can be downloaded from the website of @PenangInstitute here: penanginstitute.org/programmes/pen…

As a summary, @chedetofficial's RM1 trillion debt figure can be obtained by adding up the total offiicial govt debt (MGS & GII), the total statutory guarantees & some of the 'hidden' debt & guarantees e.g. Pembinaan BLT & PFI.

Just to be a bit more technical, the statutory guarantees are not all the same. Some entities such as Khazanah & TNB can easily generate their own cashflow to service their GG loans. But others such as Danainfra & Prasarana are dependent on govt grants for loan servicing.

Of course, we don't know the true exposure of the govt via 'hidden' debt and guarantees including the guarantees for the amount owed to IPIC which cannot be found anywhere in the Accountant General's financial statements for the govt.

Hence, the need for a thorough review of all the MOF Inc owned entities and also all the major Public Private Partnership (PPP) agreements in order to ascertain the true level of govt exposures. #endthread