‘We can build HSR by 2020’
BY
PATRICK LEE
Making connections: Liow (left) speaking with Liu Yunshan, secretary of the Secretariat of the Communist Party of China Central Committee.
KUALA LUMPUR: China is confident that it can build the Kuala Lumpur-Singapore High-Speed Rail (HSR) line by 2020.
China embassy’s economic and commercial counsellor Wu Zhengping expressed confidence that the original target date could be met – within certain parameters.
“Technically, it’s possible if Chinese companies are awarded the contract. We will be able to achieve that by 2020. We’ve still got five years,” he told
The Star in an interview.
He was commenting on reports that the HSR line would not meet its original target date.
Wu pointed out that it took a mere three years to build the 1,318km Beijing-Shanghai HSR line, which was completed in 2010. It opened to the public in June 2011.
The 350km Kuala Lumpur-Singapore line is expected to cost about RM40bil while there are matters between Malaysia and Singapore which are expected to be ironed out by year end.
Wu said China was determined to build the line, adding that it would fall in with its plans to link Kunming to Singapore via some 2,700km of rail.
Calling it the “Pan-Asian Railway”, he indicated that this would cut through Laos, Thailand and Malaysia.
He added that not all of this railway might be high-speed lines, especially in Laos, which has rough, mountainous terrain.
Wu said the HSR traffic might not be enough to justify building such a line but spoke of an economic “spillover effect” if it were to happen.
Chinese companies here, he added, might even start to develop areas near the Singapore-Kuala Lumpur line.
“If China is awarded the contract (in Malaysia), we’ll encourage Chinese companies to locate their factories and firms along the railway line,” he said.
He also said there were plans to build high-speed train cars in Malaysia should China be given the contract.
Asked what would China do if Chinese companies were unable to win the HSR bid, Wu said Malaysia had given assurance that this would be “open, fair and transparent”.
Transport Minister Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai, who is in Beijing on an official visit, said while he welcomed the offer from China, the open tender would only be called after details of the project had been thrashed out between Malaysia and Singapore.
He said a memorandum between the two countries would be signed by end of this year, adding that it would then take another year to complete the technical study.
“By then, only we would know what is the actual period (needed to build the line).
“It is too early to say that the project can be completed by 2020 when we do not have the details yet,” he said.
