SHAH ALAM, 3 Dec: The increase in electricity tariffs by 15 percent which was announced by the central government is not something that is “unusual”. Instead, this was expected since Barisan Nasional (BN) won the 13th General Election (GE-13) in May.

The Executive Councillor in charge Housing, Building Management and Urban Settlement, Iskandar Abdul Samad, said that the drastic action is seen as inappropriate since the people are currently becoming more burdened with the increase in prices of goods and petrol.

“Of course we admit that an increase (electricity tariffs) is needed, but we should look at if the people can afford it especially in the current situation.

“However, it has been understood that BN is synonymous with “prices of goods up” and we expect that the price of other goods and services will go up,” he said yesterday.

Iskandar said that the central government should take measures to control the electricity services as done by the Pakatan Rakyat (PR) government on the water management in Selangor.

“BN should emulate Pakatan Rakyat (PR), especially in controlling services such as water and electricity. For example, the state government has taken action where we control concession companies so that the water tariff will not be increased or sued.

“This is similar for electricity. The central government should do this so that the tariff can be controlled,” he said.

Today, Putrajaya confirmed the increase in electricity tariff by 14.98% or 4.99 cents to 38.53 cents per kWh for Peninsular Malaysia and five cents for Sabah and Labuan, which will take effect in January 2014.

The increase was announced by the Minister of Green Energy and Water, Datuk Seri Dr Maximus Ongkili in a press conference in Parliament today.

The current electricity rate is 33.5 cents per kWh and 3.5 cents or 25.3% under the original cost at the rate of 42 cents per kWh.