12.6 million to benefit from BKM

 

KUALA LUMPUR: A total of 12.6 million individuals or 60% of the country’s adult population will benefit from the RM1.74bil allocated under Phase 2 of the Bantuan Keluarga Malaysia (BKM) scheme, says the Finance Minister.

Tengku Datuk Seri Zafrul Tengku Abdul Aziz said the beneficiaries comprised four million households, 1.2 million single senior citizens and 3.4 million single people.

He said eligible recipients had started receiving the payment in stages from yesterday.

To date, a total of 8.6 million BKM recipients have had their applications approved, with each household expected to receive up to RM2,600 per family this year.

“BKM is a direct cash aid initiative which was announced during Budget 2022.

“It is to assist those in need to help them recover in the post-pandemic period and to ease the burden of the high cost of living.

“Phase 2 of BKM has been improved with additional cash aid worth RM630mil, with the cumulative allocation now coming to RM8bil, the highest in history.

“BKM is the highest direct cash aid in the country’s history compared to 1Malaysia People’s Aid (BR1M) and Bantuan Sara Hidup (BSH) programmes,” he said.

He said the maximum BKM rate was RM2,600, compared to BR1M’s RM1,200 and BSH (RM1,480).

He added that this was a 120% increase since the cash aid initiative was introduced, saying that there were 8.6 million BKM recipients and 4.5 million BSH recipients.

“This increase is because the eligibility limit to receive BKM has been increased from those with an income of less than RM4,000 per month for BSH to less than RM5,000 for BKM,” he said in a statement.

Eligible recipients can check their payment status at https://bkm.hasil.gov.my

The Finance Ministry would continue to monitor external factors that could have a negative impact on the domestic economic situation to ensure the cost of living was controlled, Tengku Zafrul added. - Star