Gerbang Perdana in a “Head I win, Tail You Lose” situation asking for RM360 million compensation instead of RM100 million, making costs of cancellation more expensive than building the  RM1.1 billion crooked half-bridge

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Media Statement
by Lim Kit Siang  
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(Parliament, Monday) The outrageous demand by Gerbang Perdana Sdn. Bhd seeking RM360 million in compensation for the scrapped crooked half-bridge in Johore instead of RM100 million is matched by the outrage committed by the Works Minister, Datuk Seri S. Samy Vellu in refusing to give particulars of Gerbang Perdana’s more than tripling of the original claim.

With Gerbang Perdana asking for RM360 million compensation instead of RM100 million, it will be cheaper to build the RM1.1 billion crooked half-bridge.

Parliament was told in April that the costs  of the cancellation of the RM1.1 billion crooked half-bridge was RM350 million, i.e. RM100 million compensation to contractor Gerbang Perdana and RM250 million to build a new highway joining the  new Customs, Immigration and Quarantine (CIQ) complex in Johor to the Causeway.

Until Samy’s shocking revelation yesterday,  these costs already ballooned to over  the RM1.1  billion costs of the crooked half-bridge exceeding the original costs of the crooked half-bridge, totaling RM1.12 billion comprising:

(i)                 RM100 million compensation;

(ii)               RM470 million instead of the RM250 million eight-lane elevated highway from the new CIQ to the Causeway because of related works such as connecting roads and amenities;

(iii)             RM170 million which had already been spent on the crooked half-bridge before it was cancelled; and

(iv)               RM380 million demand for land premium by the Johore State Government.

There are many questions which Samy Vellu should answer, for instance, why the eight-lane 800 metre-long elevated highway is so expensive as to cost RM280 million  when the average cost of quality eight-lane elevated highways meeting international standards is between RM75 million to 80 million?

Now, there is the shocker of Gerbang Perdana more than tripling its original compensation claim from RM100 million to RM360 million.

Samy Vellu has said that the government would not pay Gerbang Perdana its new claim of RM360 million compensation.  Even if the government pares the new Gerbang Perdana claim of RM360 million, but so long as it is more than the RM100 million compensation reported to Parliament, the costs of cancellation of the crooked half-bridge would exceed the costs of building it.

Parliament and the nation are entitled to know how the government had landed Malaysian taxpayers in such a ludicrous situation with regard to the crooked half-bridge where the proponents of the project, including Gerbang Perdana, are placed in a position of “Head I win, Tail you lose” – with 26 million Malaysians made the suckers.

(03/07/2006)