Izham says 88% of motorists exceed the 60kph speed limit on Persiaran Mokhtar Dahari. – Bernama
SHAH ALAM: A road safety study has found that 88% of motorists using Persiaran Mokhtar Dahari (B49) exceed the 60kph speed limit, which shows widespread non-compliance.
Selangor Infrastructure and Agriculture Committee chairman Datuk Izham Hashim said the study, finalised by the Public Works Department (JKR) on Oct 22, found that speeding was particularly prevalent during off-peak hours.
"The findings show that most motorists fail to observe the speed limit, with cars accounting for 73% of offenders, followed by motorcycles (15%) and lorries (12%). This is among the main factors contributing to accidents.
"Speeding is particularly common during off-peak hours, while heavy congestion during peak periods prevents vehicles from travelling at high speeds," he told a press conference on B49 safety and improvement measures at the Sultan Salahuddin Abdul Aziz Shah Building here on Thursday (Oct 29).
Izham had earlier chaired a technical meeting on the route, attended by Selangor JKR director Shukri Ishak.
He said the study also found that B49 carried an average of 80,300 vehicles daily on weekdays and 64,000 on weekends, pushing the road's Level of Service (LOS) to F, the lowest classification, with average delays of 7.6 minutes and queues stretching 1.5km.
To address congestion in the medium term, Izham said the state government had approved RM3mil to add a 300m lane from Puncak Alam towards Shah Alam at the Alam Budiman junction.
The project, which includes upgrading traffic lights, street lighting and drainage, is scheduled to begin in mid-2027 after topographical surveys and utility assessments are completed.
"The state government takes residents' concerns over road safety and traffic flow at the junction seriously. However, structural solutions such as a multi-level flyover require detailed assessment because costs could exceed RM1bil," he said.
For the longer term, JKR has proposed widening a 5km stretch of B49 to four lanes under the Second Selangor Plan (RS-2), at an estimated cost of RM128mil.
Izham said the proposed upgrade could improve the road's LOS from F to C or D, depending on future development and traffic growth in surrounding areas.
He noted that Selangor JKR had imposed conditions requiring nearby developers to provide additional through lanes towards Shah Alam at the Persiaran Pulau Lumut-B49 junction in Alam Budiman and at the Greenhill Residence junction in Puncak Alam.
He said developers must ensure that road capacity keeps pace with new developments to avoid placing further pressure on residents and public infrastructure.
Izham also urged motorists to drive responsibly and observe road safety signs to reduce the risk of accidents.
He said the state government had spent RM4.2mil since 2023 on safety improvements, including temporary additional lanes, solar-powered street lighting and tree pruning.
The road safety study also recorded nine accidents along the route between March and October this year, including one fatality. – Bernama
Law and institutional reform minister Azalina Othman Said says the system is easily comprehensible and more focused.
Law and institutional reform minister Azalina Othman Said said the government welcomed any suggestion to improve the country’s electoral system. (Bernama pic)
PETALING JAYA: The “first-past-the-post” (FPTP) system remains relevant in the Malaysian context and should be maintained, Azalina Othman Said told the Dewan Rakyat.
Citing a 2011 report by the Election Commission, the law and institutional reform minister said the FPTP system was also adopted by large democracies such as India and the UK.
“This system is easily comprehensible and more focused, and it allows for a closer relationship between the voters and the elected representative,” she said in a written reply.
Azalina was responding to Oscar Ling (PH-Sibu) who wanted to know if the government was considering the “proportional representation” system.
She said the government welcomed any suggestion to improve the country’s electoral system.
“Any proposals must be reviewed comprehensively and take into account policy, the law and the impact on the country’s political landscape.”
FPTP is an electoral system where the candidate with the most votes in a constituency wins, while under proportional representation a party gets seats in Parliament based on the percentage of votes it receives nationwide. - FMT
MALAYSIA’S economy has proven remarkably resilient. Growth reached 5.2% in 2025. While projections for 2026 vary, the economy is expected to continue expanding, supported by strong domestic demand and an electronics export upcycle. The ringgit has also strengthened, while the fiscal deficit is narrowing.
But resilience is not invulnerability. Beneath the headline numbers, Malaysia faces economic risks that are more deeply rooted than the usual narrative of “external headwinds” suggests.
The real danger is not a single shock, but the compounding effect of external volatility on an economy whose domestic foundations have been quietly eroding for more than a decade.
Malaysia’s openness, a source of strength, is also a major vulnerability. The IMF and World Bank have warned that risks to growth are tilted to the downside, driven largely by external factors.
As a highly open economy, Malaysia is exposed to renewed protectionism. Higher US tariffs on Malaysian exports could slow manufacturing and dampen business sentiment.
The electrical and electronics (E&E) sector, which accounts for 55% of Malaysia’s exports to the US and employs about 3.5% of the labour force, is particularly vulnerable.
(Image: The Economic Times)
The ongoing conflict in the Middle East has pushed up energy prices and shipping costs. If production disruptions emerge, the spillover effects on domestic costs and consumer spending could be significant.
Malaysia’s recent export strength has been heavily driven by AI-related demand for semiconductors and data centre investment. The World Bank has flagged the risk that a correction in global AI activity could affect Malaysia through both trade and financial channels.
A repricing of AI-related assets could trigger capital outflows and tighter financial conditions. Malaysia’s dependence on this single growth driver is a double-edged sword.
External shocks are cyclical. What should concern policymakers more are the structural weaknesses that make Malaysia more vulnerable when those shocks hit.
The World Bank has documented how wage growth in Malaysia has lagged GDP growth since 2010, with real median wages rising considerably more slowly than the economy.
The OECD’s 2026 Economic Survey delivers a blunt assessment: Malaysia’s education outcomes have deteriorated, with 15-year-olds ranking in the bottom third of PISA participants in mathematics, reading and science in 2022.
Between 2018 and 2022, Malaysia was among the six countries with the largest declines across all three subjects.
(Image: Pexels/Pok Rie)
The latest PISA results also show that Malaysian students continued to perform below the OECD average in all three subjects in 2025. This is not a short-term economic risk. It is an intergenerational one.
While fiscal consolidation is progressing, the government’s commitment to reducing the deficit to 3% of GDP by 2028 depends on revenue measures that have yet to be fully implemented.
Large energy subsidies remain, and the OECD has called for a shift towards targeted transfers and the reintroduction of a broad-based consumption tax.
Without these measures, public finances remain vulnerable to shocks, while the fiscal space available to respond to future crises remains limited.
Many tertiary-educated workers are employed in jobs below their qualification levels. These graduates face a wage penalty. This is not just a labour market inefficiency; it represents a significant underutilisation of the country’s most valuable resource.
The good news is that Malaysia’s policymakers largely know what needs to be done. Malaysia needs to move from broad energy subsidies to targeted transfers, broaden the income tax base and consider the reintroduction of a consumption tax.
This also means making preschool free and compulsory, improving teacher incentives, granting schools more autonomy and aligning tertiary curricula with labour market needs.
The productivity problem is, at its root, a skills problem. No amount of industrial policy can compensate for a workforce that is not acquiring the skills the economy requires.
Foreign equity caps, burdensome cross-border digital service requirements and preferential treatment for state-owned enterprises can all stifle the private investment that drives productivity growth.
The dominance of government-linked companies in key industries risks crowding out the innovative, fast-growing firms Malaysia needs.
The AI boom has been a windfall, but over-reliance on any single sector, whether electronics, commodities or AI-related demand, creates vulnerability. Strengthening services exports, tourism and high-value manufacturing beyond E&E would help reduce this concentration risk.
Malaysia’s economic resilience is genuine, but it has been supported partly by fiscal practices that may not be sustainable and partly by favourable circumstances: a timely AI upcycle, favourable terms of trade and a domestic economy that has held up well.
The risks ahead are not just about what happens in Washington, Beijing or the Strait of Hormuz. They are also about whether Malaysia can fix its productivity engine, educate its next generation and manage its public finances before the next shock arrives.
Resilience is not a permanent condition. It is a policy choice, renewed every year. Malaysia has made the right choices before. It needs to make them again, this time with a longer time horizon than the next quarterly GDP print.
The author, Prof Datuk Dr Ahmad Ibrahim is affiliated with the Tan Sri Omar Centre for STI Policy Studies at UCSI University and is an Adjunct Professor at the Ungku Aziz Centre for Development Studies, Universiti Malaya.
The views expressed are solely of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of MMKtT.
PRIME Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim has rightly warned that declining reading habits and shallow thinking threaten civilisation. His remarks should be more than a clever observation. They should prompt Malaysia to act.
As Anwar noted in an Oct 28 reflection on James Marriott’s The New Dark Ages: The End of Reading and the Dawn of a Post-Literate Society, information is everywhere, but the patience to read, reflect and think deeply is fading.
Access to information does not automatically translate into understanding, wisdom or sound judgement.
People can scroll through hundreds of headlines, videos and social media posts daily and still struggle to distinguish facts from opinions, evidence from speculation, or reasoned arguments from emotional noise.
If Malaysia wants stronger education, social cohesion and democratic accountability, reading must become a national priority.
First, we must change how we educate our children. A system that rewards memorisation and reproducing expected answers cannot, on its own, produce independent thinkers.
(Image: The Star)
Students need to learn how to question assumptions, weigh evidence, compare arguments and recognise their own biases.
Schools should set aside a daily 20-minute reading period and encourage students to explore literature, history, science, biographies and current affairs beyond examination requirements.
Teachers should ask what an author is arguing, what evidence supports the argument and what might be missing. These exercises should span all subjects, not just languages.
Examinations must also place greater emphasis on comprehension, interpretation, problem-solving and applying knowledge to unfamiliar situations. Teacher training should support this shift from supplying answers to cultivating thought.
Second, reading must become part of family and community life. Parents can read with young children and show that learning extends beyond school.
Public libraries should serve as active learning centres, supported by mobile libraries, reading circles, author talks and intergenerational programmes, particularly in rural and low-income communities.
Reading materials should be available in Bahasa Melayu, English, Mandarin, Tamil and other relevant languages. Malaysia’s linguistic diversity is an intellectual asset, not a barrier to national unity.
The National Library of Malaysia, schools, local authorities, universities and civil society groups should coordinate sustained efforts rather than rely on occasional campaigns.
Third, Malaysians need stronger digital literacy. Social media enables widespread access to information but can also encourage snap judgements.
Misleading headlines travel quickly, while artificial intelligence can generate convincing answers containing factual errors or fabricated references.
Students should learn to verify sources, spot manipulated images, examine statistics and compare reporting from independent outlets. Schools could ask students to compare conflicting reports on the same issue and identify differences in evidence, omissions and framing.
Restrictions on smartphones during lessons may help protect concentration, but young people must also learn to use technology constructively.
Fourth, critical thinking must be encouraged in public life. Debates over race, religion, education, public spending and environmental protection are often reduced to slogans and partisan loyalties.
Citizens should examine evidence, constitutional principles, costs and long-term consequences rather than accept claims simply because they come from a preferred political or social group.
The government must lead by example. Ministers should explain decisions with evidence, acknowledge uncertainty and correct mistakes openly.
Universities should encourage rigorous debate, journalists should distinguish verified facts from opinion, and public institutions should welcome legitimate scrutiny. A government cannot credibly demand critical thinking while treating constructive criticism as disloyalty.
Fifth, the government should establish measurable goals. A five-year National Reading and Critical Thinking Action Plan could bring together the Education Ministry, National Library, universities, publishers, teachers and community organisations.
(Image: Unsplash/Kareem Abo El Magd)
Schools should establish baseline measures for reading comprehension and reasoning, with annual assessments tracking progress and particular attention to rural and low-income communities.
As a proposed target, Malaysia could aim for at least 60% of students to achieve minimum reading proficiency in an appropriate international assessment by the end of the programme, subject to a clear baseline and alignment with the assessment cycle.
Progress in reading habits, teacher training and access to books should also be independently evaluated.
Ultimately, reading is more than an educational skill. Literature builds empathy, history reveals the consequences of prejudice, science teaches intellectual honesty, and philosophy challenges assumptions.
These qualities matter to Malaysia’s social cohesion. Voters who examine evidence are harder to manipulate, while policymakers who look beyond immediate political gain are better equipped to tackle inequality, environmental degradation and technological disruption.
National progress cannot be measured only by income, infrastructure, qualifications or technological advancement.
It must also be measured by the quality of our thinking, the integrity of our decisions and our willingness to seek truth even when it challenges our convictions.
Malaysia does not just need more readers. It needs readers who become thinkers, thinkers who exercise sound judgement, and citizens who turn knowledge into responsible action.
Civilisation is endangered not simply when books are neglected, but when people lose the patience to understand, the courage to question and the humility to learn. Reversing that decline must become a national priority.
KT Maran is a Focus Malaysia reader.
The views expressed are solely of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of MMKtT
PARTI Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) has added one more state seat to its list for the upcoming Melaka state election, bringing its total to 10 seats up from the nine previously announced.
PKR secretary-general Datuk Dr Fuziah Salleh said the additional seat is the Ayer Limau constituency, which will be contested by the party’s candidate, Major (Rtd) Jaimi Dimon.
She noted that this addition brings the total number of seats to be contested by Pakatan Harapan (PH) to 22 so far an increase from the 21 previously announced though this remains subject to any changes involving other parties.
“Yesterday, we issued the letters of appointment (candidacy papers), and we have since added one more seat to our list. When we announced our candidates previously, it was for nine seats; today, we have added another, bringing the total number of seats to be contested by PKR to 10.
“As it stands, there are 22 (PH candidates), unless other parties also make additions as we didn’t finalise it that day, but since PKR felt we could add one more seat, we brought the total to 10 seats,” she said.
Fuziah, who is also the Deputy Minister of Domestic Trade and Cost of Living, made these remarks after attending a special press conference held by the Minister of Domestic Trade and Cost of Living, Datuk Armizan Mohd Ali, here today on the implementation of the Deepavali Festive Season Maximum Price Scheme for 2026.
Regarding preparations for the state election, Fuziah said she had visited all of PKR’s main operations centres in the state constituencies the party is contesting, and expressed satisfaction with the readiness of the election machinery.
“So far, I am satisfied with their preparations covering everything from the election machinery, polling districts, and operations centres to data and logistics and they are ready for nomination day this Saturday,” she said.
The Melaka State Legislative Assembly was dissolved on Sept 23. The Election Commission (EC) has set Nov 14 as the polling day for the Melaka state election, with nomination day scheduled for Oct 31 and early voting for Nov 10.
A total of 687,697 voters are eligible to cast their ballots in the state election. ‒ Focus Malaysia
