A former UN special rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights has claimed that the Perikatan Nasional (PN) government is backtracking on the previous Pakatan Harapan administration's commitment to revise the national poverty line.

Philip Alston (photo, above), who previously made headlines for suggesting that actual poverty is much higher than the national 0.4 percent rate, said his current view is based on PN's response to the final report of findings from his trip to Malaysia last August.