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JOHOR BARU, March 31 — A Johor DAP leader questioned the Perikatan Nasional (PN) federal government’s silence about the RM320.27 million reimbursement to Singapore as compensation for costs incurred in the cancelled the Kuala Lumpur-Singapore High-Speed Rail (HSR) project.
Johor DAP vice-chairman S. Ramakrishnan said Malaysians had to learn about the compensation from the Singapore government.
He said the PN government must explain why it was paying this sum when 95 per cent of the HSR is on Malaysian territory.
“Besides, the HSR project has not taken off. So what is the compensation for? Why didn’t the Malaysian government inform the public on the payment, instead of the Singapore government making the announcement?
“Something is seriously amiss in this transaction,” said Ramakrishnan in a statement issued here today.
He was commenting on Monday’s news reports, quoting the Singapore government on Malaysia’s full and final settlement in relation to the termination of the Bilateral Agreement on the HSR project on December 31,2020.
Ramakrishnan said the government should be more transparent about such matters as Parliament was not meeting during the Emergency and could not examine this.
“Malaysians should be hearing from our own government and not from Singapore.
“It may be because the Malaysian government had terminated the project but paying such a hefty amount for the HSR project that never took off requires Parliament’s support and the public needs to be informed of the details.
“Therefore, the Malaysian government must make a public announcement explaining the breakdown of the compensation amount,” said Ramakrishnan, who is also a former exco in the previous Pakatan Harapan (PH) state administration.
On Monday, Malaysia reportedly paid S$102.8 million (RM320.27 million) to Singapore to compensate for development costs of the HSR project.
According to news reports, Malaysia’s Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department (Economy) and Singapore’s Transport Minister said yesterday that this amount represents a full and final settlement in relation to the termination of the Bilateral Agreement on the HSR project on December 31, 2020,
For the final compensation amount of S$102 million, the ministry said the bulk of it was computed and determined when the republic acceded to Malaysia’s request to suspend the project, and was stipulated in the HSR agreements.