Replacing old cars with new ones cuts costs

Gerakan today suggested that the Penang government purchase new official cars if necessary in order to cut down on the high maintenance costs for the old vehicles.

Penang Gerakan chairperson Dr Teng Hock Nan said it was unwise for the state government to keep cars which are 10 to 12 years old because it is expensive to maintain them.

He added that old vehicles also suffer frequent breakdowns and major wear and tear.

"It would be meaningless to keep paying high maintenance costs for old cars when the state government can save so much in buying new cars," he told a press conference at the Gerakan state headquarters in George Town.

He chided Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng for trying to gain political mileage by publicizing the state government's decision not to purchase the newly ordered five Proton Perdana V6 cars last year.

Immediately after taking over the state government in March last year, the Pakatan Rakyat government cancelled the purchase order made by the previous Barisan Nasional administration.

The five cars would have cost the state government some RM623,000, and Lim had said the cancellation was part of his government's measures to cut down administrative costs.

‘Spending more unnecessarily'

However Teng, a senior executive councillor in the previous government, said the new cars were ordered to replace the existing ones such as Mercedes Benz and Volvos used by senior high- ranking government officers.

He argued that the maintenance costs for some of these old cars would see the state government forking out about RM10,000 per month.

The Gerakan leader rebuked Lim (right) for portraying his government as cost effective by hiding the fact that it would cost more to maintain old cars in the long run.

"The current state government is unnecessarily spending more money on old and less reliable vehicles.

"If necessary, it should replace the old ones with new cars to save costs," said Teng when commenting on the Auditor-General's Report 2008 that touched on the frequent replacement of tyres for government vehicles.

According to the state government, the costs to change these tyres was RM31,000 last year.

Malaysiakini could not obtain a comment from Lim regarding this issue during a separate press conference later, as the chief minister cut the session short before the question could be posed.

"It's already late. Some other time, some other time," he said before leaving.