BR1M - Those who 'stole' RM3.34 million of our money must be charged, tried and convicted?

What 3.4 million of BR1M money lost? Who took it? It is easy to allege that it was the people - and the fault was with the Banks - but I wonder. Well, BR1M payments could have been made by directly banking it into the accounts of the people entitled - or vide cheques made out in their names. But this government chose to issue vouchers with 'no names of the beneficiary'. Well, would that not make it easy for others to have taken these vouchers and cashed it in?  

In any event, I say that the government must investigate and charge these people who have 'embezzled' the peoples' money - yes, it was our money - not the BN's money..not Najib's money. How come we have not heard of any person being charged yet more so since it has been happening from 2012? The guilty must be found and charged in court - and if it was really the people who have been awarded - I say that such behavior cannot be tolerated? Or maybe, it was 'friends' that took it and thus no action... Stealing from the government is a serious offence...cheating Malaysians of the money intended to assist the poor is a serious offence. The guilty must be found, charged, tried and sentenced - mere recovery is not enough... or accepting 'refunding' is not the solution.

BR1M - an admission by this Malaysian BN government that they have failed the people. It is an acknowledgment that households earning less than RM4,000 are earning not enough today, and in need of financial assistance from the government.

BR1M - is also a poorly thought off scheme to help the POOR - It is totally illogical to give the SAME amount of financial assistance to the very poor households (those that may be earning even RM1,00 and less) the same as households earning RM3,000. The poorer the household, the more the assistance that need be given.

BR1M - is not a long-term solution. It makes sense to give out cash assistance one time to victims of flood, etc - but BR1M is giving 'welfare assistance' to all households that earn less than RM4,000 a month. BR1M encourage dependence - not a solution that is sustainable that will assist people to earn more in the future and escape their current state of poverty...or financial problems. Look at the earlier FELDA scheme - where the poor and landless were given land and opportunity to escape poverty >> now that was a good scheme and those in the FELDA program are well off today.

BR1M is something based on government discretion - when it really should be entrenched in law as a RIGHT - a certain right for households earning less than RM4,000 - it should be enacted as law with the Social Welfare Department being the the department in charge.

BR1M is inconsistent with previous and present government actions. BR1M being an acknowledgment that households earning less than RM4,000 need financial assistance to be OK - and noting that the working members of most household is 2, being both spouses, and as such why is the Minimum Wage rate only RM900? Should it not be at least RM2,000? or RM1,500?

The government continues to do things that will only increase the Cost of Living - there was the removal of subsidies from basic items required by every family, ....

Double-dipping cost govt RM3.34m under BR1M

PETALING JAYA: The government overpaid a total of RM3.34 million in Bantuan Rakyat 1Malaysia (BR1M) due to irresponsible recipients cashing their vouchers more than once.

The amount was a combination of the total BR1M payment made from 2012 until 2014, the Auditor-General’s Report 2014 Series 1 released today showed.

The report stated that a total of 2,188, or 0.05%, recipients for BR1M 2012 cashed their vouchers at least more than once amounting to RM1.11 million, 2,490 (0.04%) recipients for BR1M 2013 amounting to RM1.14 million and 1,899 (0.03%) recipients in the first phase of BR1M 2014 amounted to RM1.09 million.

As of Dec 31 last year, 1,555 recipients from BR1M 2012, 1,850 recipients from BR1M 2013 and 1,401 recipients from BR1M 2014 who had double-cashed their vouchers failed to refund the money to the Finance Ministry.

The report added from the interview with the coordinating officers in charge of BR1M distribution, it was found that the banks opened an offline mobile counter and only brought the list of recipients, cash money and verification stamp.

The payment was given to BR1M recipients through the name list without making further checks thorough the online database, the report said.

“This opened up a space for the BR1M recipients to take advantage by cashing their vouchers more than once,” the report added.

The report recommended replacing the BR1M voucher with an approval letter for recipients without bank accounts to prevent a recurrence of cashing BR1M vouchers more than once.

It also suggested the government should increase awareness among recipients on the requirement to open a bank account to channel cash assistance directly into their account.

The payment of BR1M is one of the initiatives under the National Key Results Areas (NKRAs) undertaken by the government in address the issue of cost of living to ease the rakyat’s burden.

The government distributed RM2.09 billion cash assistance to 4.2 million recipients in the implementation of BR1M 2012, RM2.83 billion to 6.8 million recipients in BR1M 2013 and RM3.64 billion to seven million recipients in BR1M 2014. - The Sun Daily, 6/4/2015, Double-dipping cost govt RM3.34m under BR1M

Monday April 13, 2015 MYT 8:28:24 AM

‘BSN not among banks that made multiple BR1M payouts'

PETALING JAYA: Bank Simpanan Nasional (BSN) has clarified that it was not among those banks that had made multiple payments to some recipients of the 1Malaysia People’s Aid (BR1M).

In the 2014 Auditor-General’s Report, it was pointed out that some recipients were paid more than once due to an absence of real-time links between various banks and the BR1M database to identify individuals who had already been paid.

“BSN wishes to highlight that this occurred due to the absence of links between banks, which will enable the updating of payment records to a common database on a real-time basis,” said BSN deputy chief exeuctive for retail banking Datuk Yunos Abd Ghani in a statement yesterday.

He stressed that BSN only paid BR1M recipients once, and that “the other payments made by different banks resulted in multiple payments to the same recipients”.

The Auditor-General reported that over 6,000 Malaysians have abused BR1M by making fraudulent claims for the cash aid that cost the Government more than RM3mil between 2012 and 2014.

Some fraudsters had been found to have made up to four overlapping claims during each BR1M payout.

According to BSN, it had implemented an online and real-time system to manage BR1M payments since it began assisting the Government in channelling the money to ease the burden of the low income group.

“Verification of recipients’ identity was done through biometric and MyKad authentication. With all these processes in place it is totally impossible for BSN to concede double claims.

“Payments were only made after clearance had been obtained online and payment records updated within seconds,” said Yunos, who added that the practice of updating the common database on a weekly basis had created a window of opportunity for unscrupulous recipients to make repeat claims.

“As far as BSN is concerned, all payments had been made using genuine serialised vouchers with security features in place.”

More information can be obtained by calling BSN at 1300 88 1900 or visiting www.mybsn.com.my. - Star, 13/4/2015, ‘BSN not among banks that made multiple BR1M payouts'