Petaling Jaya City Council (MBPJ) remains a holdout nearly a year after the state-led Selangor Intelligent Parking (SIP) system was slated for launch across four pilot local councils.
Petaling Jaya mayor Datuk Mohamad Zahri Samingon confirmed that MBPJ still has not signed the privatisation agreement with concessionaire Selmax Sdn Bhd, citing lack of clarity from state advisories.
“MBPJ has not signed the privatisation deal because we have requested information from the state advisory chamber.
“We already wrote in, but there has been no reply.
“We are waiting for the black-and-white view,” Mohamad Zahri told StarMetro at the city council headquarters.
In an exclusive StarMetro report in September last year, the mayor revealed that MBPJ pulled in a whopping RM13.8mil annually in parking revenue – the highest among all local councils in Selangor.
Under the proposed SIP scheme, that lucrative stream would be sliced up, with 50% going to the private concessionaire, 40% to local councils and 10% to Menteri Besar Selangor Incorporated (MBI).
Despite a verbal agreement reportedly reached during a closed-door meeting last September, Mohamad Zahri has maintained a cautious stance.
His position remains unchanged: MBPJ will not sign until there is an ironclad guarantee its revenue will not drop below current levels.
Last year, he said the city council’s main focus was that income must remain the same or increase.
Mohamad Zahri added that MBPJ was finalising the profit-sharing percentage and that all details must be clearly codified before a formal commitment was made.
MBPJ’s continued resistance to the agreement follows a severe disruption to the SIP platform caused by a major cyberattack on June 30, which crippled parking payment services for users both inside and outside Selangor.
It was earlier reported that the system had to be temporarily shut down due to the cyberattack.
SIP provider Rantaian Mesra Sdn Bhd, a subsidiary of MBI, confirmed that enforcement officers would hold off on issuing summonses during the period.
On July 1, Selangor local government and tourism committee chairman Datuk Ng Suee Lim revealed that the cyberattack had affected parking platforms across 64 local councils nationwide.
On the morning of July 2, Rantaian Mesra announced that the system was back to normal.
