50,000 students might miss PTPTN loans this year

Compiled by  NG SI HOOI, HANIS ZAINAL AND A.RAMAN

ABOUT 50,000 students may be deprived of their National Higher Education Fund Corporation (PTPTN) loans when they enrol for varsity courses between July and December this year, reported Berita Harian.

This was because 183,000 people had defaulted on their PTPTN loans, involving a loss of funds involving RM1.3bil.

“Their failure to pay is serious as they represent 19% of the total number of PTPTN borrowers so the fund is losing RM1.3bil in future loans,” a source told the Malay daily.

He said while the Finance Ministry had granted PTPTN a RM4bil allocation for this year, the amount could only cover 75% of the new and existing borrowers.

About 25% would not get the loans.

PTPTN, said the source, had suggested for defaulters to be blacklisted under Bank Negara’s Central Credit Reference Information System (CCRIS) but this idea was rejected by the Cabinet.

“However, PTPTN may tighten the requirements for new borrowers to ensure that more people can get the loans,” said the source.

> Harian Metro reported that the bungalow of a successful entrepreneur in Sungai Buloh was raided by enforcement authorities for selling sex stimulants containing banned substances.

The man, who had appeared several times on television and penned a few books, was widely considered to be an icon for entrepreneurship and believed to have earned tens of thousands of ringgit a month from selling the stimulants.

Selangor enforcement chief Adnan Salimin said the stimulants sold by the man, who is in his 50s, were found to contain sildenafil and steroid.

“The man has been selling the stimulant for over four years, most of which are aggressively marketed online via a network of distributors around the country,” he said.

Raids were also carried out at the homes of two distributors in Shah Alam and Cheras, where officers seized RM200,000 worth of products.

• Found in translation is compiled from the vernacular newspapers (Bahasa Malaysia, Chinese and Tamil dailies). As such, stories are grouped according to the respective language/medium. Where a paragraph begins with a >, it denotes a separate news item.