Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim has hinted that the 2027 Budget will include measures to ease financial hardship among university students, including those going hungry and those forced into debt. He was speaking at the National Youth Economic Forum at the Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre on 3 Oct, and said no details would be disclosed before the Budget is tabled on Oct 9, New Straits Times reported.
“There are university students who say, ’We want to study, but we are hungry.’ We are focusing on that. I will announce it during the Budget,” Anwar said. “There are poor students who cannot afford it and are forced to take on debt. These are things we have to listen to and address.”
Anwar, who is also finance minister, said the unity government had always listened to the aspirations and concerns of youths, particularly those in higher education. He did not say what the measures would be, drawing cheers and applause when he added that he could not announce everything at once, Malay Mail added.
The remark follows his comment a week earlier that he had heard of lower-income university students going hungry and living on instant noodles, and that the Treasury already had several preliminary proposals on the issue. At the forum, organised by the Perdana Fellows Alumni Association, Anwar received six youth-led policy proposals drawn from a nationwide survey of more than 2,000 young Malaysians, along with a memorandum of Budget 2027 proposals.
The proposals covered artificial intelligence, green entrepreneurship, skills development, public services, foreign direct investment and a proposed National Youth Economic Action Council as a channel for youth input into economic policy.
Anwar argued that the money exists to fund such support if leakages are plugged, pointing to 1MDB, Tabung Haji and Felda as scandals in which billions of ringgit were drained through governance failures. “There are university students who say, ’We want to study, but we’re hungry.’ We will feed them,” he said. “This country is not poor. Alhamdulillah, it has wealth,” The Star said.
On politics, Anwar told the audience that young Malaysians should not be cast only as future leaders. “You are not only leaders of the future, but also leaders now, working together,” he said, and added that youth should not be reduced to political tools expected to follow blindly, nor have their freedom to think, speak and question suppressed.
