KUALA LUMPUR, May 20 — The move to increase seats in matriculation colleges will not affect the university enrolment chances of Sijil Tinggi Persekolahan Malaysia (STPM) certificate holders, the Education Ministry (MOE) said today.

In a statement, the ministry said that it adheres to the meritocracy system with regards to student intakes, and students who make the cut owing to their academic excellence, will be given their due university seats, regardless of creed.

“The 15,000 seats increment for the matriculation programme, which was decided by the Cabinet recently, will not affect the student intake process overall, because they are all the same batch of students.

“The number of seats which can be offered depends on the public universities’ facility and capacity,” the ministry said.

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It added that between 2017 and 2018, 4,242 and 1,981 university acceptance letters were given to STPM and matriculation programme leaves respectively.

Last month, Education Minister Maszlee Malik had announced that the number of places for students enrolling for the Education Ministry’s matriculation programme has been increased to 40,000 from 25,000 previously.

He said the issue was brought up a Cabinet meeting, with the additional intake implemented to ensure the best-performing students have a higher chance to further their studies.

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He said the Pakatan Harapan (PH) government sees a need to boost the number of students in the sciences field, hence the increased student intake.

Maszlee said the ministry will also discuss with the Finance Ministry on the additional cost of taking in more students.

PH allies have been engaged in a verbal war with each other over, on whether the 90 per cent Bumiputera quota should be retained.