attn bus commuters! get your report cards!
Post on Apr.27, 2006
all of you were in school before and know what a report card is right? that is to check on how you are doing in school with the various subjects and overall. well, a group of NGOs who had been monitoring the bus revamp service in penang, has now come out with a report card for bus. this report card is basically for a bus commuter to monitor the bus which they hops on to, to find out like (as the Qs appears in the card), how long you waited for the bus, were you over-charged, was the bus dirty and so on. what a bus commuter need to do is to take a card and fill in the details ofeach bus that they take. yes, one card for one bus.
the card measures 10.5 x 14.5 cm, and is in yellow colour, printed on both side – english on one side and bahasa malaysia on the other side. these cards had been distributed to some bus commuters already. i personally carry about 10 of this cards for my personal use and to give to friends who take the bus. if you want the cards, you can drop in my office (address as above in the card, under ‘penang office for human development’
to collect them.
the data on the report cards that were returned (one had already been returned. see here) will be collated and thus the NGOs will be able to monitor how’s the new bus system doing, direct from the bus commuters themselves. it is hope then that these findings will then be presented to the authorties.
note: more information on the report card and matters concerning the bus revamp service can be found on the penangwatch site.
Filed in announcement, penang
April 27th, 2006 on 9:25 AM
And you think Penangs arrogant authorities will listen to the users of public transport, dont make me laugh.
They never did and never will, unless Gerakan is thrown out of Penang………
They know whats good for you and you have to swallow it!
lucia: come, come albert, you are too cynical. first of all, how sure are you if gerakan is out, and another party comes in, this party will not be as bad as gerakan? anyway, but that is irrelevant here.
the authorties had already listened. those NGOs, esp. the newly formed BUG had put pressure on them. we need people to come out to make noises, to take actions, only then the authorties will sit up and take note…. yeah maybe only take note but not take action, but at least the pressure is on them. in this new bus system case, it was through the action of BUG that pressured the gomen to start issuing bus tickets. and now that we have this bus report card monitoring, the authorities knows that there are people out there doing something, (and not sit quietly suffering in silence or grumbling in kopi-tiam/mamak stalls, or criticising in front of the PC), they will tend to be more alert and careful with their plannings and decisions, aware that they must try to consider the rakyat’s view. they might not listen to us completely but at least we let them know we are doing something.
May 27th, 2006 on 12:34 PM
Thanks for helping to disseminate the bus report cards. BUG will be collecting these cards back by the end of May -please let us know if anyone is still keeping the filled cards. I
lucia: no problem, ong. glad to help.
were you aware that this post of mine was picked up by global voices online? this means more people (esp. those out of malaysia) knows about the report card.Â