BUTTERWORTH, Jan 18 — The government is willing to pay the RM30 due to each eligible Malaysian under its e-Tunai Rakyat (people’s e-cash) programme and accessible through selected e-wallet operators, by banking the allocation into the bank accounts of beneficiaries who do not have smart phones.

Finance Minister Lim Guan Eng said this would be carried out if many complaints were received, and the payments would be made into the bank accounts of beneficiaries who are also recipients of the Cost of Living Allowance provided by the government.

"We can study the matter in the future. Let’s run this programme first (e-Tunai Rakyat) and look at its development. If there are many complaints about this matter (the request to bank in the RM30), we will consider them,” he told reporters after a visit to the Bagan Ajam Tesco supermarket here today, in conjunction with an event on the e-cash programme.

The programme which began on Jan 15, enables about 15 million eligible Malaysians to each claim a RM30 allocation through three e-wallet operators comprising Grab, Boost and Touch ‘n Go.

From its launch until noon today, a total of 1.7 million applications under the programme had been received, out of which 1.32 million had been approved, with almost RM40 million spent, said Lim.

"This is a government initiative to promote the digital payments system as an important step towards a cashless society. The cashless payment system is a better, more efficient way to ensure that everything can be done authentically, and in an orderly manner, without any element of abuse or corruption,” he added. — Bernama