PAS MP Mahfuz Omar today reassured the public that plans to vote down Budget 2016, as a bid to show no confidence in Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak, will not hurt the rakyat.
This is amid concerns that the bid, if successful, will halt supply for essential services and civil servants' salaries.
"Rejecting the budget only means a better budget is needed. This means a new budget will have to be re-tabled," the Pokok Sena MP said.
"What will then need to happen is for Najib to resign, for a new cabinet to be formed, and a new budget tabled. This was what happened for Budget 2000," he said.
The only difference is that Budget 2000 was rendered void because parliament was dissolved before it was passed, while rejecting Budget 2006 is a move to reject Najib and the cabinet, he said.
The budget for the year 2000 was tabled twice, the first time on Oct 29, 1999 by then Finance MInister Daim Zainuddin.
However, parliament was dissolved on Nov 11, 1999, rendering the proposed budget moot.
It was retabled on Feb 25, 2000 after the general election and the formation of a new cabinet, but government services operated as normal, he said.
"If Najib insists not to resign, he will need to re-table a budget just for the first two months of 2016, and then table a new budget in February.
"And if he refuses to do this, he will need to seek an audience with the Agong to seek dissolution of Parliament," he said.
'MPs should reject an anti-rakyat budget'
Ministries are winding up the Budget 2016 debate, after the second reading in the ongoing Parliamentary sitting.
Pakatan Harapan MPs said they will vote down the budget and urge other MPs, including from PAS, to follow suit.
PAS said its PAS MPs will not vote down the budget and will abstain from the vote entirely.
Mahfuz, however, said the decision lies with individual MPs.
"Rejecting the budget will not burden the country or rakyat but it will smear the Najib administration and BN government.
"An anti-rakyat budget should be rejected to ensure a better pro-rakyat budget can be tabled so as to not burden the people...
"Whether the budget received majority support of the House depends on each parliamentarian and how far they want to ease the rakyat's burdens," he said in a statement.
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