Rafizi backs TNB’s digital meters

Party vice president Chua Jui Meng has launched an online campaign against the new digital meters.

PANDAN: PKR strategic director Rafizi Ramli has lauded Tenaga Nasional Berhad’s (TNB) digital meters as “more accurate” than the conventional analog meters.

Rafizi’s statement comes after party vice-president Chua Jui Meng’s online petition over the digital meters, which the latter claimed was “the cause for the significant percentage of increase” in electricity bills.

Chua had questioned the reliability of the digital meters and called for an independent body to be formed to look into the matter.

“TNB is now migrating from analog to digital (meters). I tend to believe that the public was under billed because the analog was not accurate… the digital is more accurate,” Rafizi told FMT in an exclusive interview here.

“People are apprehensive because there is a hike in their electricity bill. They believe TNB is using a ‘cheating’ meter.

“But the real cost of hike is not so much. The difference between the old and new is not extra nominal. Accuracy differs only 10 to 15%. The real issue is the tariff itself,” he added.

Rafizi explained that the cost incurred by consumers in the first band differs significantly – “almost double” – from those in the second band.

“One air-conditioner unit is enough to push electricity to the second band. It is very discriminatory towards the urban and semi-urban,” he said.

“When the government spends RM18 billion a year on fuel subsidy, one would expect our electricity to be more competitive,” he added.

Rafizi lamented that he does not see the problem “resolving itself in near future”, and praised Chua’s campaign in spreading public awareness on the issue.

“The campaign is important because the public has to understand. Only when they understand that the tariff is killing their monthly income, it would redirect the political pressure on IPPs (Malaysia’s Independent Power Producers’) and federal government,” he said.

He stressed that it was “not fair” for the public to wholly blame the electricity hike on TNB and labeled the latter a “convenient scapegoat”.

“The tariff is negated by the federal government. Naturally, TNB will ask for a higher tariff because they have to meet their financial targets.”

Last week, PKR launched an online petition following numerous complaints over the marked increase recorded by the digital meters.

The committee will hand over the petition to TNB and Electricity Commission to pressure both parties to agree with the set-up of an independent body to check the accuracy of the digital meters.

‘Bakun dam constructed for profits’

Speaking on alternative sources of power, Rafizi slammed Sarawak’s Bakun dam as a profit-making venture.

“Bakun was not meant to vary fuel, it is to make money… it has become an infrastructure,” he said.

Rafizi pointed out that Malaysia has the geographical landscape for smaller and “less environmentally damaging” dams.

“We should instead have smaller hydros which are less environmentally damaging than submerge Baram for another hydroelectric project,” he said.

“This is the culmination due to lack of planning and seriousness of the federal government. I don’t think there is people-centric planning by BN for the last 20 years.”