Sarawak Church Raises RM30,000 & Counting To Help Students Fly Home To Vote For #GE15
The action was taken to help students who are unable to afford flight tickets back home, regardless of race or religion.
A Sarawak Methodist church has recently gone viral for raising RM30,000 to sponsor flights for students to vote in the 15th General Election (GE15)
In a conversation with Free Malaysia Today, a spokesperson for the Sarawak Chinese Annual Conference of Methodist Church, Nicholas Tan, said that the church aims to raise more funds to help as many students as possible travel from the peninsula to Sarawak and Sabah to vote for the election.
Referred to as the "Jom Balik Mengundi 2.0" campaign, the second installation of this programme is aimed to sponsor students from both public and private universities and colleges.
At present, more than 1,000 students have applied through the campaign, with it being open to all tertiary education students regardless of race or religion
Tan had stated that the first version of the programme helped bring about 600 students back to East Malaysia vote for GE14.
"This time, the number of applicants is overwhelming due to Undi18. Many first-year and second-year students have applied," he said.
Due to Undi18, all Malaysians aged 18 and above are now eligible to vote, as they are automatically registered as voters with their constituency based on the address on their identification card (IC).
While priority is given to students who are unable to afford flight tickets, the limitation of funds has urged Tan and others at Methodist Church to select applicants on a first-come, first-served basis. Ensuring transparency at every stage, recipients who benefit from this campaign will not be compelled to vote on way or another.
In his comment, Tan invited more Malaysians to come forward and help make the initiative a success.
However, donations from political parties will not be accepted for the campaign.
Details on how to donate for the cause can be found by clicking the image below:
Image via Google Form
To ease the travel concerns this coming election, a few airlines have also provided discounts for Malaysians who are flying home to vote:
Here are some crucial things to remember before voting this #GE15:
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