Penang BN chief hits out at Lim over toll collection remark

GEORGE TOWN:

Penang Barisan Nasional chairman Teng Chang Yeow has hit out at Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng for his pledge to maintain the second Penang bridge toll should Pakatan Harapan win Putrajaya.

Teng said Lim’s statement was against his coalition’s pledge to abolish highway tolls should they come into power.

“Lim said he would only abolish toll on the Penang bridge but not the second Penang bridge.

“But in Pakatan Harapan’s manifesto, they said they wanted to abolish all tolls. There is also toll collection for the Penang undersea tunnel project for 30 years,” he said.

It was earlier reported that Lim had said the second Penang bridge toll would not be abolished.

He was quoted as saying only the toll of Penang bridge and Sungai Nyior toll would be abolished instead if Pakatan wrests Putrajaya from Barisan.

Teng added that Umno would be contesting 15 state seats and five parliamentary seats in Penang, followed by Gerakan (13 state seats and four parliamentary seats), MCA (10 state seats and four parliamentary seats) and MIC (two state seats).

Meanwhile, Lim defended his statement for not abolishing the toll collection of second Penang bridge as “reasonable and professional”.

“The money to build the second bridge has yet to be recovered since it opened on March 1, 2014.

“It was built at cost of over RM4.5bil. If you include financing cost, then it would be higher.

“As for the first Penang bridge, a total of RM1.7bil has been collected,” he said during the Vaisakhi celebration at Wadda Gurdwara Sahib in Jalan Gurdwara here yesterday.

He said the RM1.7bil covered the construction cost of RM800mil as well as expansion works and operational cost of around RM500mil.