Member of Parliament for Bintulu Tiong King Sing BINTULU: Member of Parliament here, Dato' Seri Tiong King Sing has urged all parties to stop politicising the annual rateable value (ARV) issue and to give an opportunity to the authorities concerned to explain and address the situation. He also urged the people here not to drag the matter to the extent of voting against the government during general elections as away to express their dissatisfaction. "Whatever move that had been made with regards to the annual rateable valuation should have basic justification before coming to a reasonable evaluation," he added at a gathering for some 70 supporters of him at a restaurant here recently. Aware that certain individuals had emerged and claimed to champion the people by politicising the issue, he warned that these individuals were only promoting an attitude of confrontation that would not lead to anywhere. While assuring that he would bid for more information from the Bintulu Development Authority regarding the matter, he explained that the ARV was just an assessment or evaluation of real estate properties here. Tiong acknowledged from the complaints that he gathered, the dissatisfaction had arised among property owners who received notices of revised ARV bearing figure that was several fold higher than previous assessment fees. The complaints, he added, were also coming from low-cost house owners here who, among others, claimed that their previous assessment fees for their properties were in the region of RM100 to RM200. A notice on the revised ARV distributed lately had shown the figure to jump to the region of thousands of ringgit. He hoped that those who are not happy with the amount stated with regards to the ARV to forward any evidence of unjust assessment to the People's Service Centre that he had set up at ParkCity Commerce Square here.