Today's top 5 stories are:

1. Parliamentary updates, in which the MPs discussed the sale of dates from Israel, hardcore poverty and what it means to "eradicate" it as well as the issue of individuals smoking in prohibited public areas.

2. The Education Ministry's announcement of an initiative to improve students' mastery of Bahasa Malaysia by reading Malay newspapers.

3. Updates from the government on how they plan on helping individuals in the transport and film industry to contribute to Socso.

4. The hot weather in Malaysia, and in tangent, Papar being declared a drought disaster area, as it faces water supply issues.

5. The United States passes a bill that could see TikTok being banned in the States.

For these stories, we heard from Associate Professor Dr Adelina Asmawi, Department of Language and Literacy Education of Universiti Malaya and Mohamad Haron Othman, Head of Self Employment Social Security Scheme Division at PERKESO.

Image credit: salarko, Shutterstock

Produced by: Sudais Ferhard, Alia Zefri, Hannah Kuah

Presented by: Lee Chwi Lynn, Sharaad Kuttan

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Categories:  politics,  government,  international,  education,  technology

Tags:  bm newspapers,  poverty,  smoking,  bahasa malaysia,  socso,  drought,  hot weather,  tiktok,