CARETAKER transport minister Datuk Seri Wee Ka Siong owes an explanation to those affected by the recent breakdown of the Kelana Jaya LRT service and its “poor maintenance culture”, says DAP leader Lim Lip Eng.
“Certainly, Wee cannot wash his hands when something as major as this has happened, not once, but on several other occasions,” the former Kepong MP said in a statement today.
Yesterday (Nov 13), Rapid Rail Sdn Bhd, the operator of the LRT, MRT and Monorail services, announced that the full Kelana Jaya LRT line would resume operations as before – five days after service to 16 stops between the Kelana Jaya and KLCC stations was halted due to instability in the automatic train control (ATC) system.
The service disruption, which affected thousands of people who rely on the LRT line to get in and out of Kuala Lumpur and Petaling Jaya, led to widespread chaos, with reports of some consumers having no choice but to walk all the way home or pay exorbitant e-hailing fares, and women being robbed.
In a Facebook post yesterday, Wee said he had taken a test ride on the line as part of comprehensive testing that evaluated all parameters, including the signalling stability as the train entered and departed the stretch from the Kelana Jaya stop to Ampang Park station.
However, neither he nor Rapid Rail explained why the ATC system malfunctioned in the first place.
In his statement, Lim, who is also DAP Kuala Lumpur secretary, said many of the regular LRT commuters had to go through numerous inconveniences for the last five days.
“It (the cause of the ATC system instability) cannot remain a mystery that only the minister knows the root cause – unless, of course, there is something sinister that the authorities are trying to hide.”
He was likely referring to speculation that there were elements of sabotage at play, as highlighted by former Prasarana CEO Datuk Ridza Abdoh Salleh in a recent interview.
Lim added: “Wee only has to look at how Singapore handled the problem when its MRT system failed on July 7, 2015; the company operating the MRT services was fined a total of S$5.4 mil for a mere few hours’ breakdown.
“Back here, Wee, in his election fever, could only play the blame game and used the DAP as a punching bag for exaggerating the incident,” he added.
Moving forward, Lim posed three questions to Wee to answer:
- Shouldn’t someone take responsibility for this incident, which dragged on for five consecutive days?
- Shouldn’t the Transport Ministry take disciplinary action against those who were in charge?
- Shouldn’t there be a hefty fine or even termination of the contracts for the engineers, suppliers or contractors involved if they are held culpable for the service disruption?
“The people had enough of this kind of disruption that affects their quality of life, and yet, no one was punished for it,” he lamented. – Nov 14, 2022
Main photo credit: Datuk Seri Wee Ka Siong’s Facebook page
