Our neighbours up north will no longer make fun of Singaporean youth for taking up mandatory National Service.
Malaysia’s government will be implementing a new rendition of their National Service Training Programme (PLKN), with the first set of recruits to train in Kuala Lumpur and Pahang.
The plan? To train the youth of Malaysia to become more patriotic and civic-minded.
Of course, it’s different from the NS in Singapore whereby people serve two years to really defend Singapore.
In Malaysia, this will be their third time doing so, with the newest pilot programme to kick off in January 2025.
Talk about New Year’s Resolutions that will look to improve your body, mind and soul. Even that’s a little extreme.
Who Gets Drafted?
Malaysia’s new National Service will be starting with an intake of 500 recruits drafted, around the ages 16 to 35, giving millennials, Gen Z, and Gen Alpha of all genders something new to bond over.
The recruits chosen for this new edition of NS will include students in Form Four, Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia (SPM) leavers and students in tertiary education schools. The recruits will be trained in multiple learning modules during the programme.
Plans for a bigger intake will follow in June later that year, utilitising existing 13 army camps as well as a police camp by 2026. It will be held over 45 days.
This is the announcement from Deputy Defence Minister Adly Zahari, who announced this on 26 Oct . While original plans to relaunch the programme was set to take place in mid-2025, there was a “need to implement the programme earlier,” said Adly.
“For National Service Training Programme 3.0, the government has allocated RM50 million to begin its implementation,” Adly explained.
“We will launch the programme with its first intake in early January next year.”
National Service: Electric Bugaloo
As mentioned, this isn’t Malaysia’s first time trying to make conscription happen.
The first version of the PLKN started back in 2003, and continued successfully until 2015, when it was stopped due to budgetary concerns from the federal government.
Much like how your mother would try to force you to take up piano again despite your lack of interest, Malaysia then tried to reintroduce the programme as PLKN 2.0 the year after, with plans to make it optional by 2019.
However, also much like how your mother would then change her mind because she got worried about the people you were spending time with during piano lessons, PLKN 2.0 was abolished due to fears that the programme was used for racial indoctrination.
PLKN 3.0 was announced in 2023 to be revived with a different training programme and a lower expenditure.
Here’s a simplified summary of the South Korea martial law that even a 5-year-old would understand:
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