The Minister of Transport contemplated scrapping all cars older than 12 years old to reduce the rate of accidents in November 2013. However, the figures below given in the answer to me on 24 March 2014 showed the proposal was flawed and not based on sound scientific evidence.
In 2012, there were a total of 22,702,221 vehicles registered in Malaysia. 4,362,732 vehicles between 10 to 30 years old accounted for 19.2% of the total.
Data from the MIROS Road Accident Analysis & Database System (MROADS) show that 642,157 vehicles were involved in road traffic accidents in 2012. Of these, only 477,637 vehicles had vehicle made-year records. 73.53% or 351,187 of these were motorcars. The details are as shown below:
| 2012 | 0-5 | 6-10 | 11-15 | 16-20 | 21-25 | 26-30 | Total |
| Number | 333,180 | 9,784 | 5,161 | 2,042 | 696 | 324 | 351,187 |
| % | 94.87% | 2.79% | 1.47% | 0.58% | 0.20% | 0.09% | 100% |
From the figures, 97.66% of the accidents involved cars up to 10 years old. It is obvious that the age of the car was not the main cause of accidents on the road. In fact, many of the 2.34% of accidents involving cars older than 10 years old may also be due to human errors rather than mechanical failures.
In November 2013, the director-general of MIROS (Malaysia Institute of Road Safety Research) Professor Dr. Wong Shaw Voon proclaimed that cars older than 12 years old were not safe on the road. This was concluded after a crash test conducted on a Proton Saga manufactured in 1990 at a speed of 64km per hour. Not a 15 year-old Mercedes. Deputy Transport Minister Datuk Abdul Aziz Kaprawi subsequently stated that Road Transport Department (JPJ) would soon impose a lifespan on cars. Acting Transport Minister Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein promptly assured us that capping the lifespan on cars at 12 years would not burden car owners with debt. This was subsequently scraped after much opposition.
Nobody chooses to drive an old car and nobody chooses to put his life in danger. The fact is that 19.2% of the people could not afford new cars because of the ridiculously high prices in Malaysia. Many car owners take out hire-purchase loans of up to nine years to finance their vehicles. Professor Dr. Wong’s reasoning that cars older than 12 years were not safe to be on the road may be true. However, its significance was not supported by real life data. In fact, new cars up to 5 years old appeared to be involved in 94.87% of accidents. Does this mean we should ban new cars?
It is only appropriate that MIROS and the Transport Ministry should look at the statistics available before taking any drastic measures. Statistics from twenty-two million vehicles rather than a twenty-three year old Proton Saga. Imposing a lifespan on vehicles will definitely create a very heavy burden on Malaysians, more so with the country having one of the highest car prices in the world. I hereby urge the Transport Minister and MIROS to undertake more research to address the real causes of high road fatalities in Malaysia.