KUALA LUMPUR: Transport Minister Anthony Loke says his resignation from the Cabinet will come into effect once former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak returns home to serve his sentence under house arrest.
Loke said he had hand-delivered his resignation letter to Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim on Monday.
“I want to stress that my resignation letter has been handed directly to the Prime Minister and I had a discussion with him afterwards.
“During the discussion, he asked me to continue my duties for the time being. As for the timing of resignation coming into effect, that will be decided by the Prime Minister,” he told a press conference after launching the Malaysia Maritime Week 2026 yesterday.
Loke said he had told Anwar that there needed to be a timeframe for his continued tenure.
To this, he said his resignation would come into effect once Najib returns home to serve his house arrest after the latter was granted a conditional pardon on Sept 18.
“It has not happened yet so I am still serving (as minister) and there is no replacement planned for me yet,” he said, adding that existing ministry programmes would also continue as scheduled.
Meanwhile on another matter, Loke said a new single-window system would reduce the processing time for ship bunkering approvals from six months to several weeks by February next year.
He said the system would consolidate the various applications currently handled by different agencies into a single application process, while retaining the respective agencies’ jurisdiction.
“Previously, a bunkering application would take months, at least six to seven months, to obtain approval but with this new system we hope it will be reduced to weeks.”
Loke said the initiative would be implemented under the Transport Ministry following a Cabinet mandate, with cooperation from various departments and agencies.
He said Malaysia needed to make its bunkering sector more competitive, given the significant shipping activity through the Straits of Malacca.
“Thousands of ships pass through every year. So, this is a real opportunity, a real economic opportunity.”
