Subscribe in a reader | Subscribe by Email Do you wonder why we use so much petrol? Maybe the nature of our jobs and social life that requires travelling, plus possibly one of the worst transport systems around? Is it because we are working too hard, with out cities staying awake nearly 20 hours a day? Could it be the large number of sedans and MPVs? Since the report below says 71% of the subsidy is consumed by middle to high income level groups (meaning earning more than RM2500 per month), obviously this also means that it is being used by the group that also contribute considerably to the country. Would slashing subsidies seen as punishing the “more” contributing groups?
I think there should be an effort to improve the public transportation radically. Just imagine, from Puchong, I can’t find a direct bus going to Klang, Subang, Shah Alam, USJ, Putrajaya, Cyberjaya, Kajang, Serdang, Sri Kembangan or Sunway. Need to take a litany of trips which extends the travel time tremendously. The RapidKL bus goes from Puchong Utama or Puchong Perdana to KL via Old Klang Road, while there’s a bus from Putrajaya to Kelana Jaya that traverses the LDP. What kind of unintelligent arrangement is this? Is it a wonder then that our highways are choked daily? I think we need more than 1000 buses to immediately connect adjacent towns and suburbs in Klang Valley.
For the record, I took bus from Puchong to Central Market, and then took another bus to Section 15 Shah Alam. That’s like traveling in a V shape. If I drove, would have taken me a 20 minutes 20km journey (one way). By taking bus, it took me 2 hours and distance of 50km (one way). Go figure.
Malaysians are one of the highest fuel consumers in the region where even price increases have not deterred motorists.
Since 2004, they have consumed more than 400 litres per capita annually, which is much more than Singapore, Thailand, Indonesia, China and India. Singapore, which was ranked second among the list of six countries, only consumed 250 litres per capita in 2007.
India and China consumed under 50 litres per capita in 2007, according to data collated from the Finance Ministry, Domestic Trade, Cooperatives and Consumerism Ministry, International Energy Agency and Global Insight.
Even with fuel prices at its highest in mid-2008, when petrol was at RM2.70 and diesel at RM2.58 per litre, consumption still grew by 8% annually and almost 20 billion litres are expected to be consumed by the end of 2010.
As Malaysia practises a blanket subsidy on fuel, data made available to the Performance Management and Delivery Unit (Pemandu) subsidy rationalisation lab showed that 71% of fuel subsidy was enjoyed by the middle to high-income level groups.
Some 28% of those enjoying fuel subsidy earn more than RM5,000 per month, while 43% earned between RM2,500 and RM5,000.
Do they think by cutting off subsidies they can safe our country from bankruptcy. They only can delay it. But it will happen. All of us don’t need to be an economist to figure out this. The way they running the country, the way they managing the economy is terrible. Full of lie….full of lies. Just ask any gov servant. They will tell you. They already feel the heat…very much earlier than others.
Right on the dot of your experiencing in using public transportation.
The same applies to me. I need to walk 2km to reach the nearest bus stop. Next, going to Batu 3. Take another bus to Shah Alam to reach my office near Tesco. If I’m lucky, that’s one and half hour journey. But, if I drive, it’s a 30 min journey including the traffic jams at Giant Shah Alam junction.
By, the look of it, our government is not serious in improving public transportation. They are more interested saving some cronies that supply parts to the car manufacturers. On top of it, of course, it’s the AP for some lucky cronies.
What a kind government I have …
yeah, imagine if every day travel 20-30km (one way) to work by car. it will easily cost rm200 in petrol at current rates. so, we need to improve local transport services to reduce the time wasted travelling on the road.