KUALA LUMPUR: PUTRAJAYA: Tabung Harapan Malaysia has collected RM7.07 million up to 3pm today.
Announcing this today, Finance Minister Lim Guan Eng thanked all Malaysians for the contributions collected in less than 24 hours, which he said would be used to reduce the country's debt.
"The contribution is tax-deductible for individuals and companies. There is no limit to the tax deduction," he told reporters after receiving RM13,476.57 which had been collected via a crowdfunding effort recently.
Lim said all money collected would be audited and would only be used to reduce the federal government's debt.
He said Tabung Harapan Malaysia was established for the people to express their patriotism to help the country.
"It doesn't matter how much you want to contribute," he said.
Lim also thanked Malaysian activist Nik Shazarina Bakti for initiating the crowdfunding move and to all Malaysians who had contributed to the fund.
Nik Shazarina, who is a legal officer at Sisters in Islam (SIS), first started the crowdfunding move by urging the public to emulate the spirit of the fundraiser for Tunku Abdul Rahman's famous Merdeka Mission to London.
"The amount may seem small but the spirit behind it means a lot to help the nation in dealing with the debt,” said Lim.
On Wednesday, the government announced the set up Tabung Harapan Malaysia, which is geared towards providing an avenue for the public to donate to help the country’s financial situation.
The fund is to be managed by the Finance Ministry.
The Finance Minister had disclosed recently that the federal government’s actual debt and liabilities stood at RM1.087 trillion, or 80.3 per cent of the gross domestic product (GDP) as at December 31 last year.
Report by Azura Abas, Manirajan Ramasamy, Irwan Shafrizan Ismail, Luqman Arif Abdul Karim, Mohd Husni Mohd Noor, Hazwan Faisal Mohamad and Farah Adilla