WITH express buses unable to operate and left idle at depots for months, almost 80% of drivers have called it quits.

Express buses have not been able to operate since the ban on interstate travel under the movement control order (MCO), which came into force in March last year.

Pan Malaysian Bus Operators Association (PMBOA) president Mohamad Ashfar Ali estimated that close to 80% of some 3,000 drivers industry-wide have quit since the first MCO. Some, he said, have taken up other jobs to earn a living.

“They have not been operating the buses since last March. So a lot of drivers have left their employment, going on to other pursuits like maybe opening their own businesses,” he said.

“Who would want to sit around doing nothing the whole day long? Some are selling nasi lemak, others sell durians and some may even be driving lorries or working somewhere else.”

PMBOA has written letters to Transport Minister Wee Ka Siong and former Housing and Local Government Minister Zuraida Kamaruddin for aid to ensure the survival of these former drivers.

In a letter to Wee dated October 28, 2020, the association requested for a five-year extension to the Interim Stage Bus Support Fund (ISBSF) under the Land Public Transport Industry which was supposed to expire on December 31, 2020.

It also asked Putrajaya to eradicate the ceiling amount for the funding sum under the ISBSF scheme and to postpone the implementation of the electronic ticketing machine as bus companies were unable to foot the bill of installing the system due to cashflow problems coupled with limited supplies from vendors.

In a subsequent letter dated April 7, 2021, the association requested for a special one-off grant for the survival of bus operators.

In its letter to Zuraida dated September 8, 2020, the association said the industry has been running on losses for decades and were barely making enough to survive.

“The MCO marks the point of extinction for the bus industry,” it said in the letter sighted by The Malaysian Insight.

“Our passenger load has fallen to zero which also means zero income for bus operators but they still have to continue paying the salaries and other operations costs.”

Apart from salaries, bus operators will also have to spend on diesel, maintenance and spare parts.

They asked for assistance in the form of temporary rental waiver for bus counters and a postponement of instalment payment for financial facilities to credit companies.

Fate of Transnasional unknown

After not being paid for months, drivers for Transnasional express bus, one of the biggest players in the industry, have quit the company.

They said they have also been in the dark over the fate of the loss-making company.

A former Transnasional bus supervisor driver, who only wanted to be identified as Ramli, said operations stopped in mid-March 2020.

“We do not know the fate of the other drivers and the company’s operations.

“The management said a new datuk will take over the company but till now we have not received any news.

“All the buses have been parked at the depot in Bukit Angkat, Kajang. I cannot say anything further or else I will be in trouble,” he said.

Transnasional and Plusliner are owned by Konsortium Transnasional Bhd (KTB).

According to the group’s 2020 annual report, KTB operated an average of 80 Transnasional and 40 Plusliner buses a day.

The management  said the suspension of interstate travel led to the temporary closure of the express service.

KTB slipped into Bursa Malaysia’s PN-17 category on April 14, 2020 after its auditors highlighted a material uncertainty in the company’s ability to continue as a going concern in its audited financial statements for the financial year ended December 31, 2018.

As of September 1, the board of directors said that it was in the midst of formulating a regularisation plan to address its financial condition, with seven months left until the submission deadline.

If it fails to submit the plan to the Securities Commission and Bursa Malaysia and implement it within the stipulated time frame, the group risks being delisted from the local bourse.

For the financial year ended December 31, 2020, the company narrowed its net losses to RM24.97 million from RM90.55 million in the previous year.

However, it reported a lower year-on-year revenue of RM30.39 million for the year under review compared with RM128.98 million in the preceding year.

It continued to trend in the red this year as it reported RM9.45 million losses for the first half of the year compared with RM25.82 million in the same period last year.

It reported a revenue of RM6.03 million compared with RM22.47 million a year ago.

The group is expected to still suffer from a massive loss of revenue this year.

However, this trend will reverse when the ban on interstate travel is lifted and the various other economic sectors are allowed to reopen, it said, referring to the  business outlook in its annual report. – September 12, 2021.