Jagdeep, who is in charge of housing, said Federal Territories Minister Tengku Adnan Tengku Mansor should get his facts right.
He said between 2008 and 2016, a total of 20,887 units of affordable housing Type A and B (low- and low-medium cost) had been “physically built” in Penang.
“This is as opposed to the dismal amount of 5,124 units of similar type houses built during a similar period, from 2000 to 2007, under the Barisan Nasional administration in Penang,” he said in a statement today.
He said this in response to Tengku Adnan’s remarks that he wanted to turn Penang into a federal territory in order to ensure more affordable houses for the people.
Jagdeep said to address the shortage of affordable housing by the federal government, the state had 14 projects in the pipeline – with 26,522 units of various types of affordable housing – in all the districts in Penang.
He said the state also worked closely with the private sector, which was building 18,387 affordable houses.
This, he said, meant that over the next 10 to 15 years, Penang would see the completion of 65,796 houses – from the RM42,000 low-cost units to the Type C homes with the ceiling price of RM300,000.
Jagdeep slammed the federal government for not having built a single house in the state under the 1Malaysia People’s Housing Programme (PR1MA) since its announcement in 2013, although it was statutorily bound to provide affordable houses to all states.
He also said not a single unit of affordable housing for government servants under the 1Malaysia Civil Servants Housing (PPA1M) programme, initiated by the federal government, had been built in Penang.
He said only at the end of 2015 were applications submitted for houses to be built in Penang under the PR1MA and PPA1M programmes.
There were further delays because the applications made under these programmes had not complied with the guidelines set by the Penang government, he added.
“…Penang has been completely sidelined, marginalised and neglected whereby to-date, not even one unit of such federally initiated public housing has been built in Penang,” he said.
Jagdeep criticised Tengku Adnan’s reasons for wanting to make Penang a federal territory, saying the minister was “grasping at straws” to justify his suggestion.
“It is amusing to see that Tengku Adnan still has not got a grasp on the actual reason for suggesting that parts of certain states, including the whole of Penang, be made federal territories.
“Earlier, it was reported that one of the reasons to make Penang a federal territory was to assist its population. Now, it is reported that the minister has stated that making Penang a federal territory, ‘can help make home ownership more affordable.’”
Saying of all the states in Malaysia, Sabah was the poorest economically, followed by Kelantan and Terengganu, Jagdeep added that, going by Tengku Adnan’s logic, these states should be given priority for federal territory status.
He slammed the federal government for “completely failing to address the main issue of property ownership by first home buyers, which was the high bank loan rejection rate”.
He said the state government and the BN opposition in Penang had agreed to send a joint motion to the federal government, including Tengku Adnan, to look into the high loan rejection problem.
He also challenged Tengku Adnan to ask his BN counterparts in Penang if they agreed with his federal territory proposal.