Penang to pay out i-Sejahtera aid starting Saturday

Great benefits: Chow (second from left), deputy state finance officer Khairusany Mohamed Yusof (third from left) and Lim (fourth from right) at the press conference in Komtar. — K.T. GOH/The Star

GEORGE TOWN: Penang will spend RM50.93mil on 281,135 recipients under Phase One of this year’s i-Sejahtera aid programme.

Chief Minister Chow Kon Yeow said the aid will be disbursed via electronic fund transfer starting Feb 7.

He said the allocation would benefit 211,471 senior citizens, 16,694 persons with disabilities, 10,296 single mothers and 42,674 recipients under the golden housewife scheme.

“This programme is the state government’s ongoing commitment to the well-being of the people, particularly vulnerable groups such as senior citizens, the disabled, single mothers and housewives,” he said during a press conference in Komtar yesterday.

Chow said the allocation, which amounted to about 5% of the state’s revenue, is slightly lower than in 2025 due to a more targe­ted and focused approach.

Last year, the state government spent RM56.76mil on 290,629 recipients under various ­i-­Sejahtera programmes.

Chow said the adjustment reflected updated recipient data and stricter eligibility screening to ensure aid reaches those who are genuinely in need.

He said the initiative went beyond financial assistance, serving as recognition of the contributions made by these groups to the state’s social and economic deve­lopment.

Applications submitted after Jan 10 will be processed for payment under Phase Two of the 2026 programme, he added.

Also present was Penang social development, welfare and non-­Islamic religious affairs committee chairman Lim Siew Khim.

Registration can be carried out via the official i-Sejahtera website at https://isejahtera.penang.gov.my.

Applicants are encouraged to update their bank account details to ensure smooth payment processing.

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Australia Day marked by 'Invasion Day' rallies, anti-immigration protests

 

Protestors hold signs as they gather for an "Invasion Day" rally on Australia's national day, Australia Day, in Melbourne, Australia January 26, 2026. REUTERS/Hollie Adams

 

SYDNEY, Jan 26 (Reuters) - Thousands marked Australia's ‌national day on Monday by attending "Invasion Day" rallies in support of Indigenous Australians ‌and calling for unity,while separate anti-immigration protests also drew crowds.

Australia Day commemorates the day ‌Britain established the state of New South Wales as a penal colony, with the arrival in Sydney of ships bringing colonists and convicts.

However, for many Indigenous Australians, who make up about 4% of the country's 27 million people, ‍the holiday is known as "Invasion Day" and marks the destruction ‍of their cultures by European settlers.

At Sydney's ‌Hyde Park, the annual "Invasion Day" rally started at 10 a.m. (2300 GMT) with a tribute to ‍those ​killed by a gunman in a NSW rural town last week.

Indigenous speakers also talked about land repatriation, the high number of deaths of Aboriginal people in police custody and ⁠the need to stay united against increasing nationalism with the ‌right-wing opposition in disarray and Pauline Hanson's populist One Nation party rising in the polls.

Australia - where one in two ⁠people is either ‍born overseas or has a parent born overseas - has seen record-high immigration in recent years, fuelling discontent among some voters amid soaring costs of living and a housing shortage.

"We need a coalition of all new ‍Australians because if it wasn't for immigrants, Australia would ‌have perished," Aboriginal woman Gwenda Stanley told the rally, as she condemned Hanson.

"So don't just stand with us today. Stand with us every day."

Every year on January 26, protesters rally against the mistreatment of Indigenous people, demanding the government drop the Australia Day celebrations or move the date. However, a survey by the Sydney Morning Herald newspaper on Sunday showed a record number of Australians wanting to maintain the holiday on the same date.

Nearby, anti-immigration demonstrations began at noon as protesters, ‌estimated in the hundreds by local media, arrived carrying Australian flags on poles. March for Australia, which has been criticised for alleged links to neo-Nazi groups, organised the demonstration.

Similar events - "Invasion Day" rallies and March for Australia protests - ​are being held across the country.

Earlier in the day, in a speech as he presidedover an Australia Day citizenship ceremony, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese called for unity, not division.

View the ‘shocking’ university ranking with composure

 

Photo: VCG

The newly released "Leiden Rankings" from the Netherlands has recently drawn widespread attention. Eight of the world's top ten universities on the list are from China, with Zhejiang University ranking first, while Harvard University of the US - long a fixture at the top - fell to third place. The results sparked intense discussion. The New York Times published an in-depth analysis under the headline Chinese Universities Surge in Global Rankings as US Schools Slip, while France's Le Monde reported on January 20 that the ranking had triggered widespread shock, noting that the rise of Chinese universities has made the West less certain of itself. How should one view this "shocking" ranking? Our answer is simple: with composure.

First, the ranking does reflect, to a considerable extent, China's advances in education and science and technology. The Centre for Science and Technology Studies at Leiden University in the Netherlands, which publishes the ranking, is highly respected in the global field of scientometrics. The ranking focuses primarily on research output in high-impact international academic journals. Chinese scholars have ranked first globally for years in both the volume of SCI-indexed papers and citation counts. Judged by these criteria, it is hardly accidental that Chinese universities occupy eight of the top ten positions. In 2025, China's research and development (R&D) spending intensity reached 2.8 percent, surpassing the average of economies in the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) for the first time. The rise of many Chinese universities in the rankings is therefore a natural outcome of China's long-standing commitment to the strategy of invigorating China through science and education, coupled with sustained increases in research investment.

Most of the Chinese universities ranked in the top ten are research-oriented institutions with strengths in science and engineering, such as Tsinghua University, Zhejiang University, and Shanghai Jiao Tong University. What the ranking effectively "captures" is the growing competitiveness of China in fields such as electronic communication, materials science, physics, and chemistry. From Huawei's 5G technologies to the Tianhe supercomputers, and to the quantum satellite "Micius," Chinese university research teams have played a direct, critical, and in-depth role behind these achievements. The continuous flow of innovation generated by Chinese universities has been a powerful driver of China's transition from a major manufacturing country to a major science and technology power.

However, it is important to remain clear-eyed about the limitations of this ranking, which has a distinct focus - or preference. It places greater emphasis on universities' performance in academic research publications, reflecting only part of the picture rather than the whole. Judged by more comprehensive indicators, the more widely recognized global university rankings remain the QS World University Rankings, the Times Higher Education World University Rankings, and ShanghaiRanking's Academic Ranking of World Universities. In these rankings, universities from the US and the UK continue to dominate the top tiers. In terms of research originality, global talent attraction, and employer reputation, established Western universities still enjoy advantages. These gaps also serve as a reminder that the overall strength of Chinese universities - particularly their capacity to translate integrated technologies into real-world applications and their models for cultivating innovative talent - still has room for further improvement. 

Even so, in early 2000, the same Leiden Ranking still had seven US universities among the top 10, while Zhejiang University only made it into the top 25. Today, although Harvard produces even more research than it did back then, it has slipped to the third place. Given the progress made by Chinese universities over the past two decades, it is hardly difficult to understand why Western media might feel "shocked." This ranking has overturned many long-held perceptions. In fact, Chinese universities did not seize the spotlight "overnight." In recent years, from advances in basic research and breakthroughs in frontier technologies to leaps in strategic industries, China's scientific and technological rise has long been visible to the world. As universities serve as a "reservoir" for scientific and technological development, it is only natural that higher education institutions have made corresponding gains.

As for some Western media outlets linking the Leiden Ranking to narratives of "shifting power" or even a "new world order," this is an overreaction. Behind such "shock" lies Western anxiety over the erosion of technological hegemony. In reality, the progress of Chinese universities does not imply the failure of the West; rather, it represents a "collective increment" in humanity's overall creation of knowledge. From Harvard's liberal education to Stanford's entrepreneurial incubation, drawing on advanced educational philosophies from developed countries has itself been part of the progress of Chinese universities. At a time when global knowledge cooperation is becoming ever more closely intertwined, only by breaking free from zero-sum thinking can humanity's scientific enterprise advance together.

In a sense, the Leiden Ranking is like a mirror, reflecting both our achievements and our shortcomings. Every year, many Chinese students cross oceans to pursue their studies, with venerable Western institutions such as Harvard and Oxford remaining their "dream schools." We also hope that in the future, more international students will come to regard Chinese universities as their own "dream schools" and choose to study in China. That would be a far more persuasive kind of "ranking." 

-  Global Times editorial