Why announce RON95 cuts before ‘T15’ defined? Rafizi says all plans must start somewhere (VIDEO)

KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 23 — The government disclosed early plans to withdraw RON95 subsidy for the still-undefined “T15” of Malaysia in order to convey its intended direction for the country, said Economy Minister Rafizi Ramli.

Responding to criticism of Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim’s announcement of this and other subsidy withdrawals affecting this “T15” group, Rafizi conceded that there is no formal definition for the category at the moment.

However, he said there were already proposals on how to define the group, only that they have not been finalised at the Cabinet level.

“Why announce it during the Budget, even though it’s not finalised? The Budget is a statement of the government’s intentions,” he said in a video online.

The minister also pointed out that the Budget was not set in stone, and is being debated at the moment among federal lawmakers in Parliament, who will then vote to approve it when they agree with its finer details.

Rafizi also said all the entire plan would be laid out to the public once approved and set for execution.

“If we follow Syed Saddiq’s approach, everything would need to be detailed before being announced. But if that were the case, it would take years to finalise a budget!”

In this RM421 billion Budget 2025 tabled last Friday, Anwar said the government would retarget RON95 subsidies by the middle of next year to eliminate assistance from the “T15” that he also described as “ultra-rich”.

He also said education and healthcare subsidies for the group would be removed, as they should be helping to fund the country’s development.

This led opponents such as Muar MP Syed Saddiq Abdul Rahman to challenge the absence of a “T15” class in government nomenclature, which he said could include even households of 3.8 people earning an aggregate of just RM12,000 a month.

Today, Rafizi said terms like “T15” — just like B40, M40, or T20 — were arbitrarily-chosen statistical points that fundamentally describe the income levels of households in relation to all others in Malaysia.

He said the government’s definition of this “T15” would be multi-factorial, involving their levels of disposable income and cost of living, among others.