A private hire vehicle driver was arrested by the Land Public Transport Commission (Spad) outside its office in Kelana Jaya, Selangor, this morning, in the midst of a taxi driver protest there.

It was revealed that one of the taxi drivers at the protest, Jay Rohezan, had called for Suhaimi Abdul Manaf's services using the MyTeksi/GrabCar app earlier.

When Suhaimi arrived to pick up his passenger, the taxi drivers surrounded his car and insisted that the Spad officers arrest him.

The Spad officers conceded and arrested Suhaimi before driving him off in his own car.

It is considered illegal to use private registered vehicles for taxi services.

The taxi drivers were at the Spad office protesting against two private hire vehicle services, Uber and GrabCar, among other issues.

"I just booked this guy to see if he comes to Spad headquarters. See these private hire vehicles, they are so daring already," Jay said.

"They told us they are going to take him to the depot or main headquarters to process him. Hopefully, they will take stern action," he added.

Malaysiakini has been trying to contact MyTeksi for its response.

GrabCar is a private hire vehicle service offered under the MyTeksi app.

Earlier, taxi drivers, aided by Klang MP Charles Santiago, handed a memorandum to Spad.

A Spad officer, Kamaruddin Khairy, accepted the memorandum and said they would look into the memorandum before getting back to Santiago.

"This is not a new issue. This is just a follow-up action. We have actually held a protest in Klang with representatives from all taxi associations from Klang before this.

"But now, we have learnt that taxi drivers from other areas also have the same complaints.

"We asked Spad to come receive our complaints then, but it didn't. So now, we have come to them," Santiago told reporters after the memorandum was submitted.

Among the complaints in the memorandum is on private hire vehicles, which Santiago said compromised the livelihood of taxi drivers greatly.

Persatuan Pemilik dan Pemandu Teksi India Wilayah Persekutuan dan Selangor representative Raj Rajathinam ( photo ) asked: "They are private cars disguised as taxis. This is against the law. How come Spad hasn't taken any action against them?"

A few months ago, Spad chairperson Syed Hamid Albar had criticised private hire vehicle services such as Uber and GrabCar.

Syed Hamid was reported as saying that while the apps themselves were not illegal, operating a private vehicle as a taxi, without any permit, is illegal.

Unlike registered taxi drivers, these private vehicles are also not subject to regulations and inspections by Puspakom.

In their memorandum today, the taxi drivers also asked that they be exempted from the Goods and Services Tax (GST), claiming that the burden of the tax was four-fold for them.

They said they have to pay GST for spare parts for their taxis, for services to replace the spare parts, on fees paid to Puspakom, as well as their daily fees to the taxi companies.

They also lamented that the price hike of natural gas in Malaysia is also eating into their profits, as most taxis are natural gas vehicles (NGV).

"Natural gas prices at the global level is low. Why is Malaysia's increasing? It makes no sense," Santiago ( photo ) said.

He also pointed out that the taxi price hikes in March was the first price hike for taxi drivers in seven years.

"The taxi price hike is actually to compensate for those seven years," he said.

The taxi drivers also want to be able to have their own individual permits, so they do not have to be beholden to taxi companies.

A small group of police officers and men were also present at the protest outside the Spad headquarters, which saw about 100 taxi drivers taking part.

Other than the minor scuffle with the GrabCar driver before he was arrested, the protest ended without any further incident.