theSun | WEDNESDAY MARCH 25 2009
speak up!
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Call for tax
seminars
FROM the year of assess-
ment 2004, all salaried
taxpayers have been as-
sessing themselves. This
has shifted the burden of
responsibility for tax liabil-
ity from the Inland Revenue
Board to the taxpayer.
Under the self assess-
ment system, tax knowl-
edge is a must as taxpayers
have to determine their
taxable income, compute
their liability and submit
their returns.
Although, there are
numerous tax publica-
tions most are not easy to
understand especially the
Income Tax Act, 1967 and
the Public Ruling. In many
cases, the taxpayers fail to
identify their tax risk and
open themselves to penal-
ties from the tax authority.
I urge the government
and the board to conduct
more seminars and con-
sultation services for the
taxpayers as the 2009 tax
filing deadline for salaried
taxpayers approaches.
Lee Andrew Hs
Kuala Lumpur
Switch off for an
hour every day
WE MUST take a serious view
of the adverse impact of global
warming. Ask any Malaysian and
the chances are that they cannot
see a connection between their
daily activities and global warming.
And they cannot be entirely blamed
because the climate change effects
are not that visible in the country
even though weather extremes
have intensified in recent times.
The flash flood in Kuala Lumpur
on March 3, where two months of
rain fell within 75 minutes sends a
chilling message that we cannot
escape from the adverse effects
of climate change. In addition, the
spike in the number of heat-re-
lated diseases such as dengue and
chikungunya sends a similar mes-
sage. Awareness of climate change
among the average Malaysian and
even corporations is low.
Allowing climate change to take
its course without any government
intervention would be far more
damaging to Malaysia in the long
run. The economic impact of climate
change will be devastating: Rising
sea levels will result in shrinking land
area, reduced crop yields will pose
a threat to food security and export
earnings, while our water supply will
be in jeopardy if we continue our
“business as usual” ways .
In a neighbouring country,
the government implemented
a “Climate change awareness
programme” which conveyed the
message that individual citizens
could be “everyday super heroes”
through simple and painless habits
that save energy and reduce green
house gas (GHG) emissions. This
country also encourages corporate
organisations to report their carbon
emissions to raise awareness of
energy usage and identify areas for
improvement.
Although Malaysia and other
developing countries are exempted
from the binding “target GHG reduc-
tions” set out in the Kyoto Protocol,
we still have an obligation to limit
emissions. We should not wait until
we are forced to by external forces,
especially in the post 2012 Kyoto
Protocol period. In short, the coun-
try cannot afford to be a bystander.
The campaign to switch off lights
for one hour during Earth Hour on
March 28 is a good start. But why
limit it to only one hour a year;
why not make it one hour a day
throughout the year? Why not be
the first in the world to initiate this
new lifestyle to reduce emissions?
Dr Pola Singh
Kuala Lumpur
Follow through to success
THE plan by the Higher Education Ministry
to develop 20 academic facilities in public
universities into centres of educational
excellence by 2020 is part of the effort
to improve the image of the universities.
Already the capability of one of the com-
pleted centres has been acknowledged
abroad and has, in fact, been commis-
sioned by one foreign country to do work
for it. The minister concerned is pleased
and said that once all the centres are func-
tioning they will be constantly upgraded
with up-to-date equipment and staffed
by top academicians to make them more
efficient.
All this is very good and very welcome
but the question that is often asked by the
people, indeed the taxpayers, whenever
the government plans and embarks on
something ambitious is whether it has
what it takes to follow through with su-
pervision and monitoring till these centres
become what they are visualised to be:
efficient centres doing research, study
and work commissioned by local as well
as foreign companies or countries.
It should not be surprising at all that
there is a lot of cynicism around borne out
of long experience of seeing several grand
schemes floundering on lack of follow-
through supervision and monitoring. One
such grand scheme was the plan launched
about a decade ago to turn Malaysia into
an international centre of educational
excellence. It was a plan much applauded
by everyone then and the Malaysia Inc
concept was invoked to ensure that
everyone did their part to make it work.
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thesun says
The advantage was obvious and with sev-
eral hundred thousand foreign students
studying in this country, the scheme could
rival tourism as the top ringgit earner. The
cost of living is much lower here than in
Europe or North America and there is less
of culture shock for students from Indo-
nesia, the Philippines, Vietnam and China
studying here.
The wisdom then was that with the
country’s oil resources depleting, Malaysia
as an international centre of educational
excellence could very well earn for the
country what oil and gas had been earning.
Private colleges and university colleges
mushroomed. Some are big with several
thousand students while some are quite
small with only one or two hundred stu-
dents and some even less than a hundred
students.
As in many cases what is lacking is the
follow through. Supervision and monitoring
are much to be desired. The Malaysia Inc
concept was forgotten and soon it was as
if everyone was out to prevent the scheme
or industry from succeeding. There were
problems with the immigration depart-
ment and the police who seem to think all
Africans are conmen, all Indonesians are
illegal immigrants and all Chinese girls are
not here to study even though they have
student cards which are not too difficult
to obtain.
Thus, with millions of ringgit of taxpay-
ers money that is going to be spent, the
planned centres had better be what they
are developed to be: centres of excel-
lence.