UCSI Professional Academy General Manager Mr Sudesh Balasubramaniam and Malaysian Financial Planning Council President Mr Kee Wah Song exchanging a memorandum of agreement with guest of honour Deputy Minister of Finance YB Senator Dato’ Ir Donald Lim Sian

Kuala Lumpur, 17 February, 2011 - The Malaysian Financial Planning Council (MFPC) has appointed UCSI Professional Academy (UPA), a subsidiary under UCSI Group, as a Registered Education Provider of its Registered Financial Planner (RFP) programme. The MFPC and UPA signed a memorandum of agreement (MoA) during a forum on the government’s Economic Transformation Programme (ETP) in conjunction with the MFPC Chinese New Year Get Together held at Lanai Kijang Bank Negara Malaysia. UPA General Manager Mr Sudesh Balasubramaniam and MFPC President Mr Kee Wah Song signed the agreement, with guest of honour Deputy Minister of Finance YB Senator Dato’ Ir Donald Lim Siang Chia and UCSI University Vice Chancellor Dr Robert Bong in attendance.

“UCSI Professional Academy is pleased to embark on the collaboration with the Malaysian Financial Planning Council as a registered education provider,” Mr Sudesh said. “As more and more Malaysians seek financial help from a qualified professional, the nation’s demand for financial planners continues to grow. With this addition, we plan to help financial advisors meet the demands of today’s complex business environment as well as meet the demands of this growing industry.” 

The agreement allows UPA to offer the MFPC RFP and Shariah RFP programmes and coincides with the government’s plan to develop Malaysia into a centre of excellence for Islamic banking and finance education, training, consultancy and research. The ETP strives to transform Malaysia into a high-income nation through a series Entry Point Projects (EPPs) within 12 National Key Economic Areas (NKEA). By strengthening its financial sector, the government plans to further enable itself to serve the needs of businesses and consumers in a high-income economy.

UPA is an affiliate organisation of UCSI University, the flagship institution of UCSI Group. With the new agreement, UPA will also offer select modules of the RFP programmes to students as electives within UCSI University’s accounting programmes, recognising them as an “affiliate-RFP” upon completion. The course is the latest addition to UPA’s selection of professional certifications, which already includes certifications by the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA) and the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA). 

UCSI University was appointed in November to lead an EPP within the ETP’s Education NKEA. Under EPP10, the University is leading a group of experts in Sarawak to improve the nation’s hospitality and tourism industry by increasing the quantity and quality of workers in the field. The team is currently developing a work-based learning pilot curriculum for a Diploma in Hotel Management and will have its first intake in May. The programme will initially cater to 100 students in Sarawak and plans to eventually expand nationwide reaching 15,000 students per year by 2015.