Kidex clearly missed Selangor’s deadline

In response to claims by Kidex Sdn Bhd CEO that Kidex did not miss any deadline1, Kidex is wrong to claim that any extension of its Concession Agreement (CA) with and by the Federal Government would translate into an automatic extension by the Selangor Government.

While the date of the CA set by the Federal Government as well as the date set by the Selangor Government coincidentally fell on the same day of February 14th, this in no way means that the Selangor government has to extend its deadline, just because the Federal Government extended theirs without basis nor justification.

The Selangor Government has its own right to determine and set conditions for any development and project including the proposed Kidex Highway to safeguard the interest of its residents. In setting these conditions, the Selangor Government is within its rights to set a timeframe for the conditions to be met, the deadline of which was clearly set on the 14th of February 2015.

The 3 conditions set by the Menteri Besar, Y.A.B. Azmin Ali back in November 20142, are independent of any other condition that the Federal Government may have imposed on Kidex in the CA, and thus has to be independently fulfilled within the timeframe given.

The 3 conditions were namely:

1. The concessionaire, Kidex, must provide a traffic impact and other relevant studies demonstrating substantial benefit for commuters in terms of reducing traffic congestion and travel time.
2. There must be full transparency on the rate of return of the highway including the toll rates to be charged. This is to ensure that there will be no astronomical profits for the concessionaire and unfair burden on the users.

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3. n line with the transparency and accountability practice of the Selangor state government, Azmin Ali also demanded that the concession agreement must be fully disclosed to the public.

Kidex has clearly failed to fulfill the 3 condition above, as even the CEO has admitted in some news reports. Having already set a clear deadline back in November 2014, with the succeeding 3 months given as extension, there is no justification to further extend this deadline.

Thus, Menteri Besar Y.A.B. Azmin Ali was right in in making a clear pronouncement of the end of Kidex, enabling the residents of Petaling Jaya to Kinrara affected by this project to have closure and to move on.