Anwar reframes policies based on class, shifting away from racial lenses

Move could avoid alienating Malay majority as well as his core support of Chinese progressives

- Shannon Teoh

KUALA LUMPUR - Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim's sudden announcement that Malaysia will exclude wealthy students from education subsidies in Budget 2025 is the clearest salvo so far in his attempts to frame policies based on class, rather than race.

Since taking power in November 2022, he has repeatedly prefaced unpopular moves such as subsidy cuts and tax hikes by claiming the mahakaya (ultra-rich) have benefited disproportionately from government largesse.

During this time, his multi-coalition government has struggled to wrest the Malay Muslim vote away from the opposition Perikatan Nasional, until two recent by-election wins in Malay-majority seats.

The move to strip subsidies for primary to tertiary schooling for wealthy students followed accusations by Datuk Seri Anwar, who is also Finance Minister, that billionaires are using their influence to dodge taxes.

"I said this 25 years ago," he said on June 11, referring to his first stint at the Finance Ministry under the Mahathir Mohamad administration. "The top 10 billionaires are the most resistant to paying tax. They have contacts in high places and direct access to big shots." When launching a national symposium on ending poverty on Sept 30, Mr Anwar lamented how the wealthiest and most influential Malaysians made up the lion's share of enrolment in elite schools funded by the government, and called it a form of subsidy leakage. Such prestigious institutions include boarding schools like Sekolah Sultan Alam Shah and Tunku Kurshiah College.

The Premier added that Budget 2025, to be tabled on Oct 18, will see the end of this practice, as regardless of race, the children of the rich should pay so that the budget deficit can be narrowed and aid for the poor increased to help "liberate" them from poverty.