Yesterday, Deputy Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin announced that there will not be any toll rates hikes for 2014. To BN supporters, this is a form of a coup de grace to the speculation made by the Opposition that there would be a toll rates hike. As a sacrifice, the government will have to fork out RM400 million to pay the toll concessionaires.
If I may shoot the euphoric atmosphere down, the announcement does not guarantee that there would not be a hike post 2014, and road users such as I will still have to grind our teeth in expecting the imminent.
The move, to me, is just another attempt at improving the government’s popularity rate especially that the support for Najib Razak’s government is at its lowest I was told. In short, this is another short-sighted and myopic plan to win the people’s support.
What the Najib government may not realise is that only people in Kuala Lumpur live having to pay toll commuting to work or to get from one point to another on a daily basis. Using RM400 million of taxpayers’ money for the benefit of only nine percent of the population has to be one of the silliest plans ever. People in Perlis, Sabah, Sarawak hardly pay any toll.
How the RM400 million would probably benefit all is by pumping the amount into fuel subsidies which would have made more sense to a layman like me. I spend RM600 on an average month on petrol. I just wish Najib would kick his useless advisers out for daring to even suggest such a stupid scheme.
SeaDemon Says 