Malaysia’s 15 million “Ghost Vehicles”

 

According to figures from the relevant government sources, there were over 38 million registered vehicles against a population of just 34 million – a ratio of more than 1,100 vehicles per 1,000 people. (This article is adapted from a letter by Yap Yok Foo to FMT). 

By per capita income, Malaysia does not rank among the world’s highest. Our motor vehicle taxes are among the steepest, cheaper only than Singapore’s. How could we possibly have more vehicles than citizens? The road transport department (JPJ) runs a meticulous system for registering new vehicles, but a shockingly poor one for deleting old ones.

 

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org

 

Compiled from global transport data aggregates, including from the World Bank, International Organisation of Motor Vehicle Manufacturers and Malaysian transport ministry updates.

 

The answer does not lie in a sudden explosion of wealth or multi-car garage ownership. It lies in a systemic, bureaucratic anomaly. The root cause of Malaysia’s bloated motorisation rate is the way data is catalogued. JPJ, formerly known as the Registrar and Inspector of Motor Vehicles, apparently has a register for birth, but none for death. Unlike developed nations that clean their registries annually, Malaysia includes virtually every vehicle ever registered that has not been explicitly reported as scrapped. In essence, millions of “zombie vehicles” – rusted chassis sitting in remote kampungs, decades-old motorcycles abandoned in back alleys and vehicles long cannibalised for parts in scrapyards – remain permanently active in JPJ books. This oversight warps international comparisons. When evaluating the metric of motor vehicles per 1,000 inhabitants, Malaysia appears neck-and-neck with the most motorised nations on earth. 

Malaysia’s tax structure deepens the mystery. The country imposes some of the world’s highest excise duties on imported vehicles, second only to Singapore within the region. While this protects local manufacturers like Proton and Perodua, it makes automotive acquisition a serious financial commitment. Logically, high costs should suppress a vehicle population. The fact that the register says otherwise exposes the lack of an exit pathway for old metal. 

The problem is simple. There is no penalty for failing to report a scrapped vehicle – in fact, there is a significant disincentive. To deregister a dead car, an owner must tow it to a Puspakom inspection centre (recently liberalised) to verify chassis and engine numbers. A person with a rusting hulk in their backyard is not going to pay for a tow truck. Instead, they abandon it on public roads or sell it to a scrapyard for cannibalisation. The result? The vehicle remains “alive” in JPJ’s database and the local council is at a loss to do what is needed to tow the car away. 

To transform Malaysia’s transport data from a work of fiction into a reliable planning asset, the transport ministry must implement structured, pragmatic systemic updates. 

1. Automated ‘dead car’ purge

The most immediate fix is a rolling bureaucratic sunset clause. Any vehicle that has failed to renew its road tax (annual licence) for five consecutive years should be automatically classified as inactive or dead, and purged from active transport planning databases.

2. Liberalising inspection and scrapping incentives

The recent steps toward liberalising the vehicle inspection market by breaking old monopolies must be extended to include authorised treatment facilities for end-of-life vehicles. If local certified scrapyards are given the legal digital authority to deregister a vehicle instantly via a smartphone app upon receipt, the friction vanishes. Owners could even be offered minor tax rebates on their next vehicle purchase if they turn in an old clunker to a certified facility. 

3. Unlocking federal revenue

Automated deregistration would instantly free up an immense archive of alpha-numeric combinations. The government could systematically reclaim these dormant, high-value license plates and re-release them through the JPJ e-Bid system. This clean-up process turns a data maintenance chore into a multi-million-ringgit revenue generator for the national treasury. 

Let us not be a country that forgets to bury its dead. Zombies exist on paper. Isn’t it better to auction those zombie plates? Like “JT 1”? ha-ha.  It is time to stop counting ghosts and start counting real vehicles. Our roads – and our Treasury – will need that for planning the future! 

Reference:

Malaysia’s 15 million ‘ghost vehicles’: why our car statistics are a myth, Yap Kok Foo, Letter to the Editor, FMT, 24 June 2026