Workers don't sit in traffic for fun, MIC senator pans congestion charge

Summary

• In response to a proposed congestion charge in major Malaysian cities, MIC senator C Sivaraj says workers crawling through traffic in major cities do so out of necessity, not because it is fun.

• He warns that the congestion charge will punish said workers while also having a domino effect on the costs of e-hailing and deliveries.

• He says Kuala Lumpur’s public transportation is not strong enough to justify a congestion charge.

The proposal to impose a congestion charge in major cities would not solve traffic problems, an MIC senator warned.

This is because most of those crawling through traffic jams are doing so out of necessity and don’t have a choice, C Sivaraj said.

“The government must acknowledge a simple truth: Malaysians are not sitting in traffic for fun. 

“They are doing so because they have no reliable alternative,” he said in a statement yesterday.

He was responding to Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department (Federal Territories) Dr Zaliha Mustafa, who said that the government believes congestion charges can help reduce traffic jams by 20 percent and even help stave off billions in losses.

She said the government has identified three major cities where congestion charges will potentially be applied - Kuala Lumpur, Georgetown, and Johor Bahru.

Sivaraj said that in the case of Kuala Lumpur, public transportation reliability, frequency, and last-mile connectivity are still weak.

“In such a situation, imposing a congestion charge is not a solution, it is a punishment for those who simply want to go to work and earn a living,” he said.

He said comparisons to cities like London and Singapore were also misleading, as those places had world-class public transportation in place before imposing congestion charges.

He warned that there will also be a domino effect from such charges, from more expensive e-hailing fares, food deliveries, and even increased logistics costs that will inevitably hurt the end consumer.

Sivaraj added that instead of a congestion charge, the government should consider reintroducing the goods and services tax, which would be less of a burden on the people and generate more revenue for the government.

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