HAVE YOU EVER wondered why, at times, it takes so long to repair certain potholes, alleviate congestion at bottlenecked road junctions or realign bus routes closer to housing communities?
Welcome to the tangled relationship between state and federal governments. In Malaysia, most of the major developmental budgets, approvals and decisions sit with Putrajaya. Meanwhile, state governments are the ones handling the everyday realities based on issues such as land, local councils and licensing.
However, when the body that approves differs from the body that delivers, things get lost in translation. Action is delayed, leading to growing public frustration.
