CAN OR NOT, YOU ALL MIX AND MATCH, OKAY?

Friday last I had arranged to do happy hours with Citizen Nades. We had agreed on this whilst he was hospitalized some weeks back. It seemed ages since we knocked glass, and I was eagerly awaiting a date that had so many times been ON, then OFF, then ON, then OFF again for various reasons. So on Friday 1800hrs I called to confirm. "Cannot lah Bernard....Monday dateline, got a story but my juices ain't flowing" he said sounding disappointed, "Then top up and we'll get your juices come out in a deluge," I tempted. I failed. But I can understand. When Nades has got a story, nothing, repeat, NOTHING can get him away from his job. He belongs to that rare breed that, without batting an eye, he would take on the Almighty, if the Omnipotent challenged him on an issue. So I let him be and this is what he gave us yesterday:

I found this little gem in Google when I was doing some research into the bullet train project which I wrote about last week. Former colleague P. Gunasegaram had this to say when he argued why we don’t need the 90-minute KL-Singapore service: Despite what has been reported, there is a taxpayer subsidy to the current express rail link operated by the YTL group between Kuala Lumpur and the Kuala Lumpur International Airport. This is in the form of a charge imposed on every passenger who takes a flight out of KLIA. Effectively, all flyers subsidise the rail link, whether they take it to go to KLIA or not.

On Thursday, I started checking on what Guna had said. Seasoned journalists and those who have been on the beat, so to speak, had no knowledge of such an arrangement.

I decided to make a few calls, and hey presto! Yes, this was all part of the deal and how else could visitors and Malaysians have been suckered (albeit legally) into paying RM6 for this every time they left the KLIA for a foreign destination.

you are a sucker if you play with the big boys

Working on an average of RM5 per passenger, taking into account that domestic flights passengers had to cough up only RM2 while those bound for international destinations contribute RM6, and I used the low side – at 15 million departing passengers annually. It worked out to RM75 million and you don’t need a calculator to tote up the total over the past six years. Of course, there’ll be the usual defence to such lopsided deals and the familiar clichés will appear – it’s keeping cars off the road, it’s environment- friendly, people need a mass transporter, blah blah blah ...

THIS IS THE MIX

NOW MATCH IT ANYWAY YOU WANT

THESE EXTRACTS from the YTL Community site:

'The worst thing to do is to treat the consumer like a commodity or a sales target'
YTL Community, 30 August 2006
"These are the little joys of human service which we humbly hope can enrich our experiences of life with a legacy that affirms 'service is not an action performed, but a passion expressed' with YTL Platinum Plus for World Class Service Performance At Your Command," said YTL Group managing director Tan Sri Francis Yeoh.

AHEMMMMMMM

The Star, Saturday, May 11, 2002

YTL Corp Bhd expects 40%-owned Express Rail Link Sdn Bhd (ERL) to start making profits faster than earlier targeted as the number of passengers taking the rail link to the KL International Airport (KLIA) is said to be healthy.

“Judging from the response, we are optimistic that we will turn around faster than what people think,’’ said YTL Corp managing director Tan Sri Francis Yeoh. “We will have to see whether (the high numbers of passengers taking the rail service) is sustainable.’’

ERL was initially expected to post profits after seven years of operations.

Within 18 days of its operations, the rail link has chalked up more than 50,000 passengers.

In an earlier report, ERL executive chairman Datuk Mohd Nadzmi Mohd Salleh had said the rail link was getting about 1,800 passengers a day in the beginning, but the number had increased to an average of 3,000 a day now. The target is 6,000 passengers a day in the first year of operations.

AHEMMMM AHEMMMMM

Kuala Lumpur, 13 October 2004

Datuk Seri Abdullah’s first year in office exceeded all expectations. He lost no time in putting his individual and impressive stamp on the leadership. The country and the business community were soon made aware of and under the influence of what I call the Badawi Factor.

First there was clear evidence of continuity. This was no regime change but a leadership change and with it a new Administration. The baton had been passed to a safe pair of hands justifying the trust and confidence in Tun Dr Mahathir placed in his choice.

At the same time there was equally a sense of the winds of change blowing, of them blowing – strongly – almost enough to knock us off our feet. Datuk Seri Abdullah hit the ground running with his vigorous housecleaning efforts and his bold, stringent reform initiatives.

And we liked what we saw – outright war on corruption, on patronage and the abuse of power. Not just rhetoric but an actual crackdown. There was a corresponding drive to improve the delivery system of the public service. This was to receive an outstanding endorsement in March with those stunning election results, the best ever in all our 47 years of Independence

AHEMMM AHEMMMMM AHEMMMMMMMMMM

ERL turns profitable in 2003

ERL runs a high-speed, non-stop rail service, KLIA Ekspress, from Kuala Lumpur Sentral to Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) in Sepang. It also operates KLIA Transit, a rapid transit service that makes three quick stops at key townships along its route. Despite challenging market conditions, led by the SARS outbreak and war in Iraq, ERL turned profitable in 2003. To boost profitability, it targets to raise its daily traffic from 3,000 to 4,000 in 2003, to 6000 by end-2005.

CLAP CLAP

Speaking to the graduates at the Faculty of Technology graduation ceremony, he (the deeply religious YTL head honcho) advises them: “We must not only harness the mind, we must also harness our hearts to re-engineer the world of man and bring it back to sanity and productive endeavour. Let us not suffer from spiritual amnesia. Let us build together a lasting world full of goodness, an everlasting Empire of the Minds with Heart.” He received a rousing ovation at the end of his speech.

CLAP CLAP CLAP

AT THE END OF THE DAY, YOU AND I, THE COMMON MAN GET ALL OUR JUICES SQUEEZED AND WRINGED DRY.......BY.....AH, NEVER MIND.

NOT SO DIFFICULT HUH, THIS MIX AND MATCH EXERCISE.