Revive EPF savings via HSR, Bandar Malaysia, says Najib

 

The Kuala Lumpur-Singapore high-speed rail project was terminated in 2020, but talk about reviving the project surfaced in December last year. (Bernama pic)

PETALING JAYA: The revival of the high-speed rail link to Singapore and handover of Bandar Malaysia and other high-value government projects are among four steps suggested today for contributors to the Employees’ Provident Fund to replenish their savings.

Former prime minister Najib Razak said the four steps were:

• a new one-off withdrawal of RM10,000 under the i-Citra scheme;
• restructuring EPF dividends into four tiers ranked by contribution level;
• revising the Kuala Lumpur-Singapore High-Speed Rail project; and
• handing over the Bandar Malaysia development and several other government projects to EPF, Permodalan Nasional Bhd, and subsidiaries.

Najib did not give details of how the HSR and Bandar Malaysia handover would help EPF contributors replenish their accounts.

However, he said if the government agreed to grant a further RM10,000 one-off withdrawal, the right time to do so should be after the payment of 2021 dividends and before the start of the fasting month of Ramadan.

The one-off withdrawal had been previously proposed by Najib.

During the Johor election campaign, many opposition leaders who had previously objected to the one-off EPF withdrawal, were suddenly in favour, he said.

“Anwar Ibrahim, Lim Guan Eng, Bersatu and PAS (made their) U-turns and supported (EPF withdrawals). I hope this support is not a temporary one that was motivated by the election season,” he said.

Last week, EPF said it does not have a plan to allow one last withdrawal by contributors. EPF chief executive officer Amir Hamzah Azizan said that the fund’s priority is to rebuild the retirement savings of contributors.

During the Covid-19 lockdown period, the government created three EPF withdrawal schemes, i-Lestari, i-Sinar and i-Citra. These have now ended.

The original High-Speed Rail project, proposed in 2010, would have cut travel time from Kuala Lumpur to Singapore to less than two hours. It was terminated when the agreement expired on Dec 31, 2020. However, in December last year, Singapore said Malaysia had suggested discussions on reviving the project.

The Bandar Malaysia project is a massive commercial development and transport hub to be built over 20 years in Sungai Besi, Kuala Lumpur. It was said to have a gross development value of RM140 billion. - FMT