No Cancellation Of Projects Under Ninth Malaysia Plan, Says Abdullah

KUALA LUMPUR, March 25 (Bernama) - Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi said there will be no cancellation of the projects under the Ninth Malaysia Plan.

"At the moment, we have not decided on the matter. If it is necessary and if there is a good reason for the cancellation, we will. I'm not saying that we are definitely going to do this (cancellation), but we certainly will have to reassess all the projects," he told reporters after officiating at the Invest Malaysia 2008 Conference here Tuesday.

On the projects in the states that were controlled by the opposition, Abdullah said the federal government would discuss the matter with them.

"We will deal with the state governments. There are certain projects that are about to be implemented in the states. There is no problem for the government to discuss with them," he said.

Earlier in his speech, Abdullah said some programmes may have to be fine-tuned under the mid-term review for the Ninth Malaysia Plan in order to ensure that the benefits were enjoyed by all Malaysians.

"Of course, there are projects that have already been implemented. There are many and we have to make sure that they will be able to meet the objectives that we have set," he said.

He said the government was aware that increasing prices had affected some of the projects that were implemented.

"We have already identified them and specific allocations have been made and we have to see what we can do.

"It certainly involves the need to reassess and re-estimate the money that we are going to allocate," he said.

Abdullah said the construction industry has improved.

"You are saying that the industry is very slow. In 2003, it recorded minus two percent and now it is +4 percent. Is that slow?" he said.

-- BERNAMA