SINTOK, 4 Nov 2018:
National Higher Education Fund Corporation (PTPTN) chairman Wan Saiful Wan Jan today hit out at some errant PTPTN borrowers for their selfish and irresponsible attitude in depriving others of study loans.
He said some of them applied to postpone their repayment because they had to pay for their car loan instalments.
Such an excuse is unreasonable, he said – adding that if they could afford the car instalments, they would also afford to make repayments for the PTPTN loan, which is as low as RM90 a month.
“There are many appeals. If they cannot pay (PTPTN loan) because they are not working (yet) or parents are sick, we can consider that, but if it is to buy a car, that is not fair,” he told a media conference at a programme at Universiti Utara Malaysia here.
He said the situation reflected a selfish culture in the society, with the errant PTPTN borrowers not knowing their priorities.
“This concerns attitude. What is their priority? They have benefited from PTPTN, completed their studies, got jobs and should settle the loan repayments so that others can also enjoy the benefit.”
Wan Saiful said PTPTN borrowers earning more than RM1,000 a month – who had problems making their repayments through salary deduction of between 2% and 15% – could appeal to the corporation.
He said the scheduled salary deduction of the PTPTN borrowers would be implemented during the first quarter of next year, with briefing sessions on the matter to be conducted nationwide until end of the year.
Finance Minister Lim Guan Eng, when tabling Budget 2019 in Parliament on Friday, proposed the introduction of a progressive loan repayment schedule with a percentage ranging from 2 -15% of the borrowers’ monthly income to those with at least RM1,000 in monthly income.
Today in SEMENYIH, Lim said repayment deferment of PTPTN loans – as promised by the Pakatan Harapan (PH) government – is difficult to be implemented, due to the country’s current fiscal position.
While admitting the government was badly criticised after the announcement on the matter was made during the tabling of Budget 2019, he said the government really had no other choice.
“I accept the criticisms as we really want to implement it (the promise to allow deferment of PTPTN loan repayments), but it is hard to do it due to the current fiscal position.”
Prior to this, Education Minister Dr Maszlee Malik was reported as saying the PH government would defer repayment of PTPTN loans for borrowers earning RM4,000 a month and below, in a bid to reduce the people’s burden.
– Bernama