From Wan Agyl Wan Hassan
On Sept 27, a one-year-old boy lost his life at the Bukit Kajang toll plaza. A lorry carrying scrap iron rammed into waiting vehicles. In seconds, a child was gone, at least seven others were injured, and another family left broken.
Brake failure was cited as the cause. But Malaysians know these tragedies are never about a single mechanical fault.
They are symptoms of a broken system, one where unsafe vehicles continue to operate, where fragmented enforcement leaves gaps, and where accountability rarely extends beyond the man behind the wheel.
This pattern is painfully familiar. A recent study revealed that one person dies in a lorry crash every 36 hours in Malaysia.
Causes range from poor vehicle maintenance, overloading, and driver fatigue to weak enforcement and profit-driven industry practices. Toll plazas, bottlenecks by design, amplify these risks. When heavy vehicles fail, they fail catastrophically.
Malaysia is not without reforms. From October…