KUALA LUMPUR, April 19 — Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad assured depositors that their money in Tabung Haji (TH) would be properly managed by the Pakatan Harapan government.

He said TH had been ill managed over the years, resulting in not making much profits.

"Actually, they are not making any money, so they take the deposit and pay as dividends, so a lot of people keep their money there because they see a lot of returns from the investments.

"This cannot go on forever,” he told a news conference at the Al-Bukhary Foundation here, today.

Dr Mahathir said in order to ensure that people continued to keep their money in TH, the government would pay dividends to depositors using the returns from the investments that it made even though the amount might be small.

"This means the people who want to perform the haj would still be willing to put money (in TH) because it will be well managed, not like before where the deposits of pilgrims were used to subsidise pilgrimage and also declare dividends,” he said.

Early this month, TH announced dividend distribution for 2018 at the rate of 1.25 per cent, the lowest in its history. — Bernama