PUTRAJAYA: Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak is going against convention this year by bringing forward the Budget tabling in Parliament to 3.30pm instead of 4pm.
Najib said this year’s Budget tabling, his ninth as finance minister, will start earlier to accommodate Asar and Maghrib prayer times (4.19pm and 6.59pm, respectively).
“If my speech extends for two-and-a-half hours, I want to make sure people have time to perform their Asar and not encroach into Maghrib,” Najib said at a briefing to editors here today.
Another change this year is that the meeting to go over final preparations for the budget will be held during the day, instead of at night on the eve of the Budget tabling.
“At night, I should spend time to internalise the speech. I have to look at every single word in the text.”
“There’s a lot to be said.”
Earlier this week, the prime minister also released a curtain-raiser article on the 2018 Budget, to give a broader context and perspective on his vision for the nation’s economic development moving forward.
“This is the first time I took the initiative to explain the thinking behind the strategy and vision for this year’s budget,” Najib said.
