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BUKIT MERTAJAM: A group of tour bus operators today filed a police report against five federal ministries for “not” helping them during the Covid-19 pandemic.
The head of the Northern Coalition of Tour Bus Operators, Ahmad Ruslan Abdul Latiff, said the government rubbed their wounds with salt when Budget 2021 ignored their pleas for help, especially for loan repayment moratoriums to be extended.
This led them to present a report against the ministries of Finance, Transport, Tourism and Culture, Domestic Trade and Consumption and the Ministries of Housing and Local Government today.
Ahmad Ruslan said the police report was made to “get the attention” of the government after his repeated calls for help in recent months were ignored.
He said one of the requests was for the government to take over the debts accumulated by bus operators by purchasing buses and financing their operations through credit companies.
Ruslan said that not all bus operators got their loans from banks.
He said their main problem was paying the insurance premiums for the buses, as they now had zero income.
He said that this had caused many of them to sell their buses to pay, and some went bankrupt. It stated that at least 1,200 buses had been sold in the northern region to date.
“In our situation, we are now forced to wash dishes, sell hamburgers and bake cakes to put food on the table,” he said.
He said his group had given Putrajaya an ultimatum to urgently address his problems or they would protest next Monday.
Operator Aziz Zainal Abidin, owner of eight tour buses, said he had to pay RM 72,000 in insurance premiums and had no money to do so.
