There are growing complaints and anger and resentment over what many Malaysians see as the foreign invasion of ownership of properties in the country causing much unhappiness among the local population.

But this scenario is set to change as Malaysian prime minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim (DSAI) stated that the existing policy where developers have to allocate a portion of their development to affordable housing will be reviewed.

New terms and conditions are being drawn up to ensure developers abide by the policy requiring them to include the construction of affordable housing in their developments following the intervention of DSAI.

DSAI commented openly that the policy does not seem to be working according to the speed and scale that is required of developers and he has asked the Local Government Development Minister to look into the policy and impose new conditions.

Under the National Housing Policy 2018 to 2025, every private housing development is required to dedicate 30 percent of its project to affordable housing and actually this policy has been in place since 1981.

DSAI questioned why it must be left to the government to build affordable housing when there are developers building multi billion ringgit projects in Gross Development Value who can easily set aside a portion of their resources for affordable housing.

-THE MALAYSIA VOICE