Thousands of Malaysian cabbies to protest in KL on Wednesday

According to The Star, Kamarudin Mohd Hussain, a member of the Klang Valley Taxi Drivers Action Committee confirmed that they would proceed with the gathering all the same.

Syed Hamid also insisted that he would not resign under pressure from the participants because he had a great responsibility to the people.

Kamarudin said over 3,000 participants were expected to join the gathering, which aimed at, among others, demanding for a restructuring of the Public Land Transport Commission (Spad) and the banning of Uber and Grabcar applications, which were seen to have affected the source of income of taxi drivers.

When asked if the authorities would take action against the demonstrators if they did gather, he said that the police and DBKL “will have to do something”.

On a proposal by taxi drivers association to review the Taxi Transformation Plan, he said SPAD was now in discussions to solve the issue.

“The existing laws clearly state that the organiser has to get approval of the owner of the place to carry out any activities there”.

SPAD said in September that private vehicle drivers using GrabCar and UberX were technically performing an illegal service because their cars are not licensed to ferry passengers, and as such drivers risk being arrested.

It has also been reported that the protestors would be demonstrating their unhappiness by blatantly causing traffic lockdowns in the KL city area amidst the ongoing ASEAN summit, which itself has caused several road closures.

At 11.30am, the group headed to Parliament with the intention of handing over a memorandum to Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak.

In a statement tonight, Dang Wangi district police chief Zainol Abu Samah said that taxi permit owners should prohibit their drivers from using their taxis as part of the protest against the SPAD chief over his alleged failure to protect the taxi industry from competition.