The Economic Ministry’s PADU project, a centralised registration database, has now reached 8.5 million as of 27th March, as announced by Minister Rafizi Ramli. He congratulated Malaysians on this achievement and highlighted how the data collected will make it easier for the government to target aid programs towards specific lower income groups.
With nearly half of the adult population registered, the government has enough data based on the profiles and household information provided by the 8.5 million to determine the close to real scenario of B40 and M40 groups in the country. This is critical to ensure that taxpayers’ money is used to aid only those who deserve government aid/subsidies and not to those who live in large houses, drive big cars, and still enjoy taxpayer-subsidized sugar, rice, petrol, and other staples.
Although there is some controversy surrounding PADU, from data security, overlapping data collection, private data, and the Sarawak State calling for a review of the system, many Malaysians have shown their maturity and understanding of the need for a centralized database of a comprehensive profile of all Malaysians. Currently, information is available across different ministries and agencies, but they are not in-sync, and the government does not have the time or resources to pool them together. The Minister’s goal with PADU is to solve this issue.
Despite the fear of cyber attacks, Rafizi has assured that the backend is secured with double encryption and a near non-hackable data storing system. This was highlighted when the Department of Statistics revealed that over 2 million external entities have attempted to hack into PADU to date.
PADU will evolve from a targeted aid disbursement application to a one-stop dashboard for all interactions with all government agencies in the future. It will become omnipresent just like your Maybank2u, mySejahtera during the pandemic, and your favorite social media app that you can’t seem to keep away from. However, unlike these apps, PADU will be useful for your needs.
We are sure Rafizi is not worried about the numbers at this point, as the government can roll out its programs with the database already collected. The announcement of aid and subsidies distributed after verifying data from PADU should encourage those who have not yet registered to do so. Those who feel they don’t need aid and hence don’t need to register for PADU will likely do so once more useful integration is undertaken in the future.
