DAP secretary-general Lim Guan Eng said it was incorrect for Ismail to claim this without first checking the facts.

“Ismail must either be badly informed or confused between the 12MP and the ongoing 2022 budget consultations held by the opposition with finance minister Tengku Zafrul Aziz.

“Ismail should get his facts right if he wants to set a good example for his Cabinet members,” Lim said in a statement today.

The former finance minister said it was the failure of the government to rely on facts and figures that had resulted in its inability to handle the Covid-19 pandemic effectively and pull the economy out of its current recession despite launching eight economic stimulus packages amounting to RM530 billion.

Lim said Ismail’s failure to rely on facts and figures had also caused some controversy in the 12MP.

One of the glaring examples of an incorrect and misleading fact in the 12MP, he said, was the statement that said the Bumiputera agenda must continue because “the median income gap between Bumiputeras and the Chinese is widening, quadrupling in 2019 compared with the gap in 1989.”

The Bagan MP said Ismail had inaccurately suggested that the inequality between the two groups is widening.

Citing statistics, he said the median Chinese household income in 1989 was RM1,180 while it was RM680 for the Bumiputeras, a difference of RM500.

In 2019, the corresponding figures were RM7,400 for Chinese households and RM5,400 for Bumiputera households, the difference being RM2,000.

Quoting academic Lee Hwok Aun, he said while the absolute difference had increased four times, Bumiputera household income had actually grown significantly faster.

He also said it was wrong for the government to only report statistics at the national level, without taking into account urban and rural differences.