A petition signed by 11,000 Malaysians was also handed over with the memorandum.
Speaking to reporters at DBKL headquarters today, DAP MP Teresa Kok said the petition was a clear indication of Malaysians opposing the parking fee hike.
Kok said one of the issues raised was over the new machines only accepting coins for every hour, as opposed to every 30 minutes.
“If somebody wants to park for an hour and a half, he has to pay for the whole two hours.
“The new system burdens consumers and they would have to pay a lot more than with the previous system,” said Kok.
She said the time frame of 7.30am to 6pm to pay to park was too long.
“Saturdays too? It’s too much,” said Kok.
Meanwhile, Segambut MP Lim Lip Eng lamented over the coin-only machines.
“Do you expect people to carry a sack of coins whenever they need to drive to KL? It also shortchanges the customers by not returning coins that are not sufficient to meet the hourly charge rates,” he said.
He added that the privatisation of the parking fee system could be a sign of corruption and urged the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) to investigate.
“The ‘best system in the world’ is actually the ‘best scam’ to cheat motorists. I, therefore, ask the MACC to take the initiative to investigate whether this lucrative privatised parking agreement involves corruption and kickbacks.
“I further ask for a moratorium of the implementation of the parking charge hike pending the MACC investigation,” said Lim.
The new parking rates were announced by DBKL and the Federal Territories Ministry late last month.
Federal Territories Minister Tengku Adnan Tengku Mansor said a RM1.50 charge would be levied for the first hour of parking in the city centre and RM2.50 for the second hour, with a maximum parking period of two hours.
“For areas outside the city centre with a high level of activity such as Sentul, Bangsar and Brickfields, the charge for the first and subsequent hours will only be RM1.
“Charges for areas outside the city centre, such as Segambut, Taman Tun Dr Ismail, Setiawangsa, Sungai Besi and Bandar Tun Razak, for the first and subsequent hours is RM0.80,” he said, adding that there would be no parking time limit in the latter two zones.
Tengku Adnan said parking fees could be paid using coins, Touch ‘n Go cards, and a mobile phone application.