Form multi-ministry task force to solve worsening traffic, says Loke

SHAH ALAM – The government has been urged to form a multi-ministry task force to combat traffic issues that have intensified over the last few months.

Former Transport Minister Anthony Loke said when it comes to the issue of traffic congestion and transportation system, it involved several ministries in the government and there was no sense of urgency regarding which ministries were responsible.

“There is no single ministry that is fully responsible for traffic and Transport Ministry can say it is not entirely their responsibility.

“I know that after being the former Transport Minister but of course, we are part of it because public transport, heavy vehicles and car ownership are under the ministry,” said Loke.

He said the main cause of the congestion was unknown to any accountable entity at the moment and he criticised the government as no ministry had come forward to acknowledge the problem.

“Ministers involved must come out clearly to acknowledge the problem and there is a problem but now there is no sense of urgency which ministries are responsible”, Loke said

He said that it was essential for the government to form a task force to coordinate strategies to address the congestion problems as it was a major issue faced by many Malaysians.

“Part of the problem, there are a lot of construction projects going on in Klang Valley such as a lot of new highways and MRT projects.

“A lot of construction sites created bottlenecks. So, is there any way we can litigate that?

“Is there any way we can talk to the contractors to see if we can divert traffic in a better manner?” he questioned.

Loke further suggested those initiatives should be coming from the Works Ministry and from the Home Ministry.

“I said simple things like ‘shall we not mobilise traffic wardens and our police traffic to be stationed at all the major junctions?’ ‘Should we not be stationed in a big way?’

“This is not happening because all ministries are doing their own thing and nobody is looking at the problem and trying to find a solution,” he stressed.

Loke was speaking on Sinar Daily’s talkshow, Wacana English Edition which discussed on ‘Rethinking Malaysia’s Transport Systems’.

Other panellists were Transport Studies Professor Prof Datuk Ahmad Farhan Mohd Sadullah and Transportation System Expert Assoc Prof Dr Masria Mustafa.

Just recently, it was reported that employees working in Klang Valley spent at least 44 hours a month in their vehicles due to traffic jams.