In his speech at today’s launch of the Teksi Madani national renewed taxi programme, Malaysian prime minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim announced a new RM10 million matching grant for the trade-in and scrapping of old taxis that’s similar to the one announced in Budget 2026 for private cars.
To jog your memory, in January the transport ministry launched a programme to encourage approximately 5,000 owners of private vehicles aged 20 and up to switch to newer, safer and more efficient vehicles from Proton and Perodua. The carrot? A grant of up to RM2,000 from the carmaker is matched by up to RM2,000 from the government, giving you up to RM4,000 in incentives.
Proton announced shortly after that the Saga and the eMas 5 would be eligible for a trade-in incentive of up to RM1,000 (which the government would match with another RM1,000) and up to RM2,000 (again, plus another RM2,000 from the government) for all its other models.
Today’s announcement encourages owners of old taxis (also around 5,000, Anwar said in his speech) to trade in for the new Proton S70 taxi, with the same RM2,000 + RM2,000 carrot.
We’re told the S70 taxi, free of excise duty and sales tax, will be priced in the region of RM64,500 on-the-road without insurance (compared to RM74,800 for an S70 Premium, including the RM5,000 launch rebate). So theoretically, trade your old taxi in and the new taxi is yours for as low as RM60,500.
Yes, yours. Due to the abolishment of the practice of granting taxi permits only to a select few, the pajak or leasing scheme also comes to an end – the driver will now maintain full ownership of the taxi. Any taxi drivers here? What do you think, and are you compelled to make the switch?
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