Thesun 2009-03-25 Page13 Follow Through To Success

theSun

13

| WEDNESDAY MARCH 25 2009

speak up! letters

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Call for tax seminars FROM the year of assessment 2004, all salaried taxpayers have been assessing themselves. This has shifted the burden of responsibility for tax liability from the Inland Revenue Board to the taxpayer. Under the self assessment system, tax knowledge is a must as taxpayers have to determine their taxable income, compute their liability and submit their returns. Although, there are numerous tax publications 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 penalties from the tax authority. I urge the government and the board to conduct more seminars and consultation services for the taxpayers as the 2009 tax filing deadline for salaried taxpayers approaches. Lee Andrew Hs Kuala Lumpur

thesun says

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-related diseases such as dengue and chikungunya sends a similar message. 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 reductions” 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 country 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 completed centres has been acknowledged abroad and has, in fact, been commissioned by one foreign country to do work for it. The minister concerned is pleased and said that once all the centres are functioning 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 supervision 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 followthrough 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.

The advantage was obvious and with several 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 Indonesia, 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 students 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 department 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 taxpayers money that is going to be spent, the planned centres had better be what they are developed to be: centres of excellence.