This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily on July 5, 2018

PUTRAJAYA: The ministry of transport (MoT) has decided to terminate the “One Community One JPJ” licence issuance programme for B2 class vehicles — motorcycles below 250cc — with immediate effect.

Licences were issued under the programme without proper testing, and this could put riders at higher risk of being in accidents, Transport Minister Anthony Loke Siew Fook told a press conference yesterday.

“The programme was meant to ease the cost of obtaining licences for rural residents, but without proper training and examination, they would face higher risks on the road. As at end 2017, there were 132,851 licences issued under this programme,” he said.

“JPJ (road transport department) officers would go into rural areas and test the driving skills of applicants, and the officers issued the licences when they were satisfied with the applicants’ performance. We are putting a stop to this programme. But those licences that JPJ has issued in the past remain valid,” he said.

Asked if the MoT would undertake another round of evaluation of drivers who obtained their licences through the programme, Loke said his ministry will study a possible mechanism to implement such an evaluation.

In the road safety initiative this year, dubbed “Ops Bersepadu”, which took place during the 2018 Hari Raya Aidilfitri festive period from June 8 to June 22, a 0.04% rise in road accidents to 22,411 cases was recorded. Of these, 235 cases involved fatalities that claimed 248 lives, a drop from 257 deaths in the same period last year.

Loke said a new approach will be needed for next year’s “Ops Bersepadu” as he considered this year’s initiative a failure, since accidents this year still claimed a high number of lives.