PETALING JAYA: Finance Minister Tengku Zafrul Tengku Abdul Aziz announced today that over six million people have received funds and one-off payments from the Prihatin economic stimulus package (BPN) as of April 12.
This amounts to RM4.9 billion with 8.3 million eligible individuals identified for payments, he said.
An additional 2.77 million new applications for the BPN have also been received.
“Looking forward, I hope that rakyat or small and medium businesses who have yet to receive assistance from the Prihatin economic stimulus package will submit their applications as soon as possible,” he said in a speech on the status of the BPN payments this afternoon.
The Inland Revenue Board (LHDN) has also received 274,000 appeal applications.
Under the Prihatin programme, the government will pay between RM500 and RM1,600 to those in the B40 and M40 groups.
Tengku Zafrul said out of the 6.6 million approved applications, 3.2 million (96.6%) are B40 households (who received a total of RM3.17 billion), and 3.4 million (92.3%) are B40 individuals (who received a total of RM1.71 billion).
He added that RM750 million will be distributed to 1.5 million beneficiaries this week.
He said tens of thousands of taxi drivers, tour guides and trishaw riders have received the RM600 aid promised to them.Meanwhile, he said more than 90,000 full-time e-hailing drivers will receive the RM500 incentive on Apr 20, involving RM45 million.
He said a monthly allowance of RM600 to medical frontliners and RM200 for others will also be paid this month, to benefit 200,000 civil servants.
On aid for students, he said RM200 one-off payments for university students have been extended to Form 6, and level 4 Sijil Kemahiran Malaysia (or the equivalent for both) students, involving RM300 million.
He said a total of 1.5 million students will receive financial assistance through the education, higher education, human resources, agriculture and primary agriculture industries, youth and sports as well as rural development ministries.
Tengku Zafrul said some 3,000 small and medium enterprises (SMEs) will get assistance under the special relief fund set up by Bank Negara Malaysia, involving RM 1.48 billion.
For the I-lestari programme under the Employees Provident Fund (EPF), 1.17 million out of a total 1.2 million applications have been given approval to withdraw RM572 million for the month of May 2020.
The government has earlier announced that EPF contributors could withdraw RM500 every month for up to 12 months from their Account 2.
On wage subsidy provided by the government, he said as of April 12, 31,000 employers and 299,000 employees have applied.
Some 98% of them are SMEs with 75 and less workers.
The total worth of the applications is estimated at RM307 million.
The government also received applications from 6,900 employers for 47,000 employees seeking aid under the employee retention programme, in which RM600 will be given every month to employees forced to go on unpaid leave.
Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin announced the RM250 billion Prihatin economic stimulus package last month to help individuals and businesses affected by the closure of businesses due to Covid-19.
On April 6, he also announced an additional RM10 billion to help SMEs.
Six out of 10 main pillars under the Prihatin economic stimulus package worth RM180 billion have started implementation.
The remaining four pillars worth RM66 billion will be implemented beginning May 1. -FMT
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