Bantuan Prihatin Rakyat first phase payment starts tomorrow - Tengku Zafrul

A total of 8.45 million recipients will be receiving payment under phase one of Bantuan Prihatin Rakyat (BPR) in stages involving RM1.93 billion allocation, said Finance Minister Tengku Datuk Seri Zafrul Tengku Abdul Aziz.

He said it involved payment to 4.4 million recipients amounting to RM300 each while 4.05 million will receive RM150 each in the unmarried individual category.

“For each household and unmarried individual recipient, the payment will be credited directly into their bank accounts from tomorrow while payment will be channeled through Bank Simpanan Nasional (BSN) branches for those who do not have bank account from Thursday (Feb 25).

“Aid recipients in Sabah and Sarawak who do not have bank accounts would be receiving payment from March 1 to April 1 at locations to be announced later together with Bantuan Prihatin Nasional (BPN 2.0),” said Tengku Zafrul in a statement today.

Prime Minister, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin when tabling the Perlindungan Ekonomi dan Rakyat Malaysia (PERMAI) assistance package on Jan 18, announced that the first phase payment would be expedited to the end of February.

Tengku Zafrul said this first phase payment was made to recipients of Bantuan Sara Hidup 2020 and BPN B40 who had been approved earlier.

He said it was expedited to assist daily-paid groups apart from the government being committed to ensure the aid allocated reached the target people.

-- BERNAMA