A number of the students met on Saturday evening with the minister from the Malaysian prime minister’s office, Seri Jamil Khir, and prime ministerial political secretary Shahlan Bin Ismail, both of whom were in Jeddah to oversee the evacuation.

“We are happy to have the support of the Saudi Arabian government,” Shahlan told Arab News.  “Saudi Arabia is a very stable country which guarantees the safety to our students. Getting help at such short notice isn’t easy. We hope when our remaining students in Egypt arrive in Jeddah, they can stay for a week here.  Then we’ll do our best to get them home,” said Shahlan.

Malaysian students in Egypt are majoring in a number of subjects, particularly medicine, dentistry, pharmacy, Arabic and Islamic studies. Many of those who arrived in Jeddah included wives and children. 

One of the female students, heavily pregnant when she arrived, had to be rushed to hospital in Jeddah shortly afterward where she gave birth to a baby. Others with families are still in Egypt. “They are expected to arrive soon,” Shahlan said.

“Our students were lucky in the sense that, they just recently have finished their examination at their universities and are in effect on holiday,” he added.

He was hopeful that the situation in Egypt would soon calm down, thus allowing students to return there to finish their studies. But that would not happen until the Egyptian government made it clear it was safe to send them back.