Former Finance Minister II Johari Abdul Ghani today shared a video of DAP lawmaker Tony Pua purportedly claiming that goods would be cheaper under the sales and service tax (SST), and asked if this had finally happened with the tax being rolled out today.

The 13-second video clip showed Pua saying: "I believe under the new SST system, even though there will be tax, but the price of goods will be cheaper."

However, according to the Dewan Rakyat hansard on Aug 7, a portion of the Damansara MP's statement had been edited out.

Pua, who also serves as the special officer to the finance minister, had argued that under SST, the prices of goods would be cheaper than under its predecessor, the goods and services tax (GST).

The actual sentence, according to the hansard, read: "So how can you say 0.8 percent, harga barang tidak turun akibat kita mengosongkan GST? The prices went down, dan saya percaya dengan sistem cukai SST yang baharu ini, walaupun cukai akan dikenakan, tetapi harga barang akan lebih murah daripada bila sistem GST bawah Kerajaan Barisan Nasional."

(So how can you say that at 0.8 percent (inflation) that the price of goods did not go down when we zero-rated the GST? The prices went down, and I believe under the new SST system, even though there will be tax, but the prices of goods will be cheaper than under the GST system during the time of the BN government).

Johari posted the edited video on Facebook and asked his followers for feedback.

"I would like to get feedback from Facebook friends. Today is the first day of the SST implementation.

"Are the prices of goods cheaper as claimed by Pua?" he said.