PEKAN, – The National Higher Education Fund Corporation (PTPTN) is ready to assist borrowers who cannot afford to make loan repayment, including those who lost their jobs.Its chairman Wan Saiful Wan Jan said among the possible assistance was to restructure the repayment schedule, however, the borrower must deal with PTPTN in person.
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“Borrowers need to come forward (to PTPTN) to address the problems they are facing and we will simplify the process so that they will not need to carry the burden any longer. If they don’t come to see us, we can’t help.
“We are going to verify that they are indeed incapable of making loan repayment. The problem we face is that those incapable of making repayment are afraid to meet us when we are actually very flexible,” he said.
Wan Saiful said this at a press conference after the opening ceremony of the Pahang-level National Education Savings Scheme (SSPN) programme at the Sultan Haji Ahmad Shah Convention Hall here today.
The event was officiated by Deputy Finance Minister Datuk Amiruddin Hamzah who also presented the SSPN-i account to 560 under privileged children from Pahang worth RM100 each from PTPTN tithe allocation.
Each student to receive the money in the form of SSPN account opened by PTPTN through the cooperation with the state education department.
Commenting on the SSPN account, Wan Saiful said 241,734 accounts with a total deposit of RM151 million were opened in Pahang as of July 31, this year, as part of 4.2 million accounts with a total deposit of RM5 billion opened nationwide, for the same period.
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Wan Saiful also advised the people in category B40 to take advantage of the matching grant incentive, a financial incentive given to SSPN-i depositors with a sum of not more than RM10,000 per qualified family.
To date, only RM2.5 million of the total allocation of the matching grant incentives worth RM1 billion has been utilised, he said.
Meanwhile, Amiruddin said the habit of savings in the SSPN-i account for educational purposes should be nurtured among parents similar to common practices among Muslims to open an account with the Lembaga Tabung Haji to perform pilgrimage.
“This means that when it is the time to further their education, the children will go to PTPTN not to borrow but to use their savings.
“Furthermore, if they are from the B40 category, they will have more savings through the matching grant incentive,” he said.- BERNAMA