PUTRAJAYA: A total of 52 stage bus operators will be given a two-year contract for the Interim Stage Bus Service Fund (ISBSF) to provide quality services in more than 350 routes covered by them in peninsular Malaysia, said Transport Minister Anthony Loke Siew Fook (pix).
Loke said that beginning this year the contract period for the ISBSF facility had been extended to two years from one year previously.
“This two-year contract will give the operators better financial capability to upgrade their services by increasing the number of buses and putting newer buses on more routes,“ he said when speaking at a ceremony for the signing of the ISBSF agreement here today.
He said the government had allocated RM110 million each for 2019 and 2020 under the ISBSF programme, which is an increase over the RM91 million provided in 2018.
Since its introduction in 2012 until 2018, ISBSF had disbursed RM785.3 million in aid to the operators involved, he said.
“Every year operators would be waiting for the renewal of the contract without knowing whether the government would continue with the programme,” he said.
Loke said the 52 stage bus operators eligible for the ISBSF had been identified and their buses would ply more than 350 routes in the rural and less populated areas.
He said several improvements had been made to the new ISBSF agreement, including the need for information on routes and bus movements to be integrated and displayed on a monitoring system provided by the Land Public Transport Agency (Apad).
Another new feature required was the installation of an electronic ticketing machine and GPS system in the bus, he said.
Loke said the two-year contract would run from January 2019 to December 2020 and operators can make claims for payments for the January-June period this year from the government beginning today.
“We will process the applications sent and payments are expected to be made in the middle of August,” he added. — Bernama
