Resistance grows within BN against AES profits
(The Malaysian Insider) – A whopping 2.72 million speeding tickets will have to be issued in each of the next five years for the two concession holders of the controversial Automatic Enforcement System (AES) cameras to just recoup their reported RM700 million investments.
And considering the authorities had only collected an average of about 25 per cent of all traffic summonses a year — which increased to 65 per cent only after a general discount was offered last year — the two companies will have to issue far more summonses to account for the poor collection.
Such calculations have led to apprehension on the part of a growing number of Barisan Nasional (BN) politicians who are concerned about the profit motive that is built into the concession agreements.
“The privatisation of the AES could be seen as attempting to make profits because some (cameras) are placed in inappropriate places,” Umno’s Seri Gading MP Datuk Mohamad Aziz told The Malaysian Insider.
The two firms awarded the contract to implement the enforcement system — ATES Sdn Bhd and Beta Tegap — will spend between RM300 million and RM400 million each to set up traffic cameras at 831 “black spots” nationwide.
Both ATES and Beta Tegap are entitled to RM16 per valid summons for the first five million issued. They will then split the remaining revenue evenly with the government up to a cap of RM270 million each.
The firms will each receive 7.5 per cent from the remaining revenue and the government will keep the rest.
Based on the business model, both companies will collect RM80 million each for the first five million summonses issued by each company. This works out to a total collection of RM160 million.
Under the second tier of the agreement, the companies will get a total of RM540 million, bringing the total amount due to the two companies to RM700 million.
Based on the even split in revenue with the government, the RM540 million figure represents 3.6 million summonses of RM300 each.
To hit the RM700 million break-even mark, a total of 13.6 million summonses of RM300 each for speeding and other major offences will have to be issued via the AES cameras
Read more at: www.themalaysianinsider.com/malaysia/article/resistance-grows-within-bn-against-aes-profits
