Whopping road hazards, whopping sum & whoppers?

230 ‘black spots’ have been identified as killer zones on Malaysia’s road system. If lives are to be saved, then all those identified dangerous stretches and accident-prone spots on our federal and state roads in Peninsula , Sabah and Sarawak should be improved to remove their hazardous features.

But Humpty Dumpty – no, he’s not promising to make those hazardous road spots ‘disappear' as he did with one complete highway – said that the cost will come up to a RM1 billion. Either he or Bernama termed the sum as a quote whopping unquote sum.

Whooping? What does that imply?

Much more of our tax money perhaps 'disappearing'? Or worse for our drivers and transport passengers, those ‘black spots’ won’t be all fixed because we don't have the 'whopping' RM1 billion?

I seem to recall we wasted more than RM1 billion cancelling the scenic bridge that never was. Yes, we spent more than RM1 billion of taxpayers money NOT building a bridge, which wasn't built yet. In fact, the ridiculous fact was it would have been cheaper to build the bridge. What kind of contractual arrangement was that, which our government committed us to? A 'whopping' government management idiocy or a 'whopping' whopper?

If this 'whopping' RM1 billion is needed to improve the safety features of those dangerous ‘black spots’ then we must implement their overhaul for the safety of the public, but I would be more confident if the government is more transparent in its costing and spending of public money. We need transparency, accountability and public scrutiny of the 'whopping' sum.

Incidentally Humpty announced the road problem and associated cost when he had his Deepavali ‘open house’ at the Putra World Trade Centre where he received ministers, corporate figures and community leaders among the 'whopping' whooping 10,000 guests.

I wonder how much it cost to host such a 'whopping' ‘open house’, but I am sure a minister’s 'whopping' monthly salary should be enough to cover it with plenty of 'whopping' change back.