Kuala Lumpur property market gains stronger Momentum

SINGAPORE, July 18 (Bernama) -- The Malaysian property market has gained stronger momentum after the May general election, which saw a turn-around in the investment market in the second quarter of the year, says DTZ Research.

In a research note titled, "Property Times Kuala Lumpur Q2 2013 - Greater Market Certainties After The Election", it said the turn around in the second quarter was driven by corporate purchases for occupational requirement despite concerns about overall oversupply in the market.

It said the overall office market was stable.

Both vacancy and rental rates remained unchanged with continued substantial supply in the pipeline.

The research house also said the anticipated oversupply sentiment did not appear to affect the market as activities remained resilient and active, supported by stable rental and capital values.

Retail sales remained buoyant with continued local and international interest for investments in the sector.

It said the high-end residential market resumed activities with several new launches during the quarter despite Bank Negara contemplating measures to curb speculation and lending.

"Now that the GE13 is over, companies are starting to proceed with major investments, which may have been temporarily held back by political uncertainties.

"We can expect stronger momentum in government-linked mega projects such as the Tun Razak Exchange (TRX) where third-party investors and developers have been invited to participate, DTZ Research added.

The total value of 12 deals recorded in the second quarter amounted to RM988.6 million compared with RM490.8 million, comprising three deals in the first quarter, mostly in the office sector.

-- BERNAMA

Give top students scholarships !

 Let top scorers study in private institutions, Malaysian govt urged

PETALING JAYA: Top scorers who fail to get into popular courses in public universities should be offered places in private institutions on scholarships provided by the Government, said MCA president Datuk Seri Dr Chua Soi Lek.

Dr Chua said MCA understood that there had been a high demand for popular courses such as medicine and pharmacy, and that the public universities would not be able to accept all the top scorers due to limited places.

“In such cases, the deserving students should be offered places in private universities via scholarships provided by the Government.

“Since the Government has stopped awarding scholarships to SPM graduates unless they are accepted into reputable universities, it now has the means to provide these to students who obtained a cumulative grade point average (CGPA) of 4.0 in their STPM examination,” he said in a statement here yesterday.

“Each deserving student must be assured of a place in university and they should not be turned away unless they do not have the required entry points,” he added.

Dr Chua was commenting on the hundreds of students - including 55 with perfect CGPA of 4.0 - who had not gained places to study medicine and other courses of their choice in public universities.

He also urged the Government to admit all top scorers with a 4.0 CGPA into public universities without further delay as they had rightly obtained the perfect cumulative grade point average.

This was in line with the country’s agenda of grooming local talent to cater to its development and vision to become a high-income nation by 2020, he pointed out.

“MCA stands firm that the Government should provide tertiary education to all students based on meritocracy. I would like to remind students with CGPA of 4.0 that they could also opt for other courses of their choice and not merely popular ones like medicine and pharmacy,” he said.

Dr Chua said that he had also conveyed this issue and the students’ grievances to the Prime Minister and the Deputy Prime Minister for further action.

Meanwhile, another 33 STPM top scorers, who met with problems in their applications to enter public universities, have also asked MCA for help after the party highlighted some 108 appeal cases on Tues-day.

Its Youth chief Datuk Dr Wee Ka Siong said that they were the latest batch, adding that he expected more to come.

Pointing out that most of the 88 top scorers had opted to study medicine, dentistry, pharmacy and engineering, he said he would “analyse on case by case basis and see how to help them.”

To date, Dr Wee said 14 of the ca­ses did not get any offers, 12 were given courses which were way off from their choices while the rest did not get what they wanted.

He said that there was also a very small number with what he des­cribed as an “unreasonable re­­quest”, such as wanting to do medicine in Universiti Malaya despite being offered places in Universiti Kebang­saan Malaysia.

By FOONG PEK YEE and EILEEN NG
newsdesk@thestar.com.my

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Top Malaysian Chinese students rejected by public universities

KUALA LUMPUR: Chai Yee Lin had always wanted to be a doctor since she was young.

She studied hard and was over the moon when she found out she had obtained a perfect 4.0 cumulative grade point average (CGPA) in her STPM examination.

The excited teenager from Puchong, Selangor, immediately applied for medicine, dentistry, pharmacy and bio-medical courses with Universiti Malaya, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Universiti Kebang­saan Malaysia and Universiti Putra Malaysia.

But her excitement turned to sadness when she was offered a course in veterinary science at Universiti Ma­­laysia Kelantan.

“Yes, I did state veterinary science as one of the secondary courses in the admission form, but I was confident that with my good results, I could get medicine or dentistry,” she said.

Chai said what hurt her most was when her friend who obtained a CGPA of 3.92 was offered dentistry in USM.

Her mother, housewife Tham Ah Yeing, said her daughter studied hard as she wanted to support the family.

“She was very sad when she found out she was offered only veterinary science. She could not accept it,” she said.

Choong Yong Sheng was one of the 4.0 scorers who was not offered any place at public universities.

“I was very happy after receiving my STPM results, and I had high hopes of gaining a place to study medicine at one of our local universities.

“I didn’t expect to be left out and given nothing,” said Choong.

The 20-year-old from Penang added that he only applied to study medicine at public universities offering the programme, and would not accept any course that was not among his options.

Matriculation student Deveshini Uthandi, 20, who scored a CGPA of 3.96 was devastated when she learnt that she did not make it to the list of successful applicants to the IPTAs.

“I had wanted to make my family proud by being the first in the family to enter a public university.

“I always wanted to be a doctor and because it is not cheap to study medicine privately, I worked very very hard to do well in my studies,’’ she said.

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