KWSP to raise awareness of retirement savings in Sarawak

KUCHING, 11 Nov: The Sarawak Workers' Savings Fund (KWSP) has intensified efforts to raise public awareness about the importance of retirement savings following the challenge of ensuring more members have sufficient savings to cope with life after retirement.

Director of the Sarawak Regional SPD, Mohammad Che Rus said that one of the main challenges is to ensure that information regarding savings interests can be communicated to about 800,000 members across Sarawak, especially those living in rural areas.

According to him, the wide geographical factors as well as limited internet access in some areas make it difficult for the CUP's efforts to reach members in full.

"We are in Sarawak geographically, a bit challenging. There's still places that haven't got internet coverage yet and it's still a long way off so it takes about two to three hours of travel.

"Therefore, we have to use various methods to approach them and make sure they seize this pension savings by seizing incentives provided by the government", he said.

He said so when he met after the Sarawak 2026 Best Employer Awards Ceremony of Kuching KSP here today.

Meanwhile, he said media cooperation is also important to help convey information about pension savings to the community, especially people in areas that are difficult to reach directly by KWSP.

In this regard, he encouraged the self-employed and those without fixed income to make use of i-Saraan initiatives to build pension savings through philanthropy consistently.

Through the initiative, the government provides incentives of 20 per cent based on the number of contributions, subject to set limits, as an incentive for those concerned to save for retirement.

Mohammad Che Rus also reminded the public to start financial planning early, taking into account the increased life expectancy of Malaysians now around 75 years and rising living costs.

Meanwhile, Kuching KWSP Chairman Azraf Mohammad Ayub Han said that employers also play an important role in ensuring the pension savings of employees continue to grow by paying contributions on a fixed period.

Chairman of Kuching Corporation, Azraf Mohammad Ayub Han.

"The employer must pay the employees' allowance on time because it is a worker's right to be cut off from the workers' wages and at the same time, the employer also has to bribe for the employer's share", he said.

According to him, timely payment of contributions is important because the calculation of KWSP dividends takes into account contributions that have been credited to member accounts.