The price for a plate of char kwai teow or rather a popular wok fried noodles with clams/mussels, an egg plus pieces of sliced fish paste, a few prawns and bean sprouts (ngar chow) or kow chow, sold in coffeeshops has gone up again with the introduction of the goods and services tax (GST) since the last time when the government hiked petrol prices.

Here, what goes up does not come down!

This (char kwai teow) has been the ordinary man's fast food since the 50s till today and it takes just a few minutes to fry it. It is served piping hot, yet there are customers who want it fried with spicy red chilli sauce.

By the way, in the old days a plate (fried local style) without egg was sold for only 20 cents,  and 30 cents if an egg is added. You see, 10 cents was a lot of money then and as such some people had brought an egg along for the hawker to fry with the noodles just to save 10 cents.

The bus fare from Imbi Road to Pasar Road in Kuala Lumpur was only 5 cents, and for 10 cents the ride will end at the Foch Avenue central bus station downtown.

Oh yes! Taking the General Transport Company (GTC) bus was really convenient and dependable. In fact, it took 10 to 15 minutes to reach any destination whether from Pudu to downtown or from downtown to Imbi Road, (but) this was dependent on the bus route - that is which way up via Bukit Bintang or Pudu Road.

For your information, GTC was taken over by the Sri Jaya bus company in the 60s.

That explained the value of 5 cents and 10 cents in those days.

The objective here is with GST, the price for a plate of char kwai teow will surely go up to between RM6.50 and RM7.50 or more because the hawkers say that they will have to pay more to buy the ingredients like prawns, eggs, fish paste, sauces, salts, monosodium glutamate (MSG), veggies, noodles, oil, and cooking gas.

On the same issue, has the government taken an in-depth study that by implementing GST also to small-time businesses such as traditional sundry shops, Chinese drugstores and Indian barbershops, etc, many will soon have to wind up their business?

Like for example, take the case of the Chinese druggists weighing the different types of Chinese herbs in small quantities by the tahils to make up a concoction for treatment of a kind of ailment or for rejuvenation, it is rather impossible to work out the GST for each minute herbs used. Besides, it is a tedious task and it takes too much time to work out the GST for a sale that is less than RM5 that involves using many different herbs.   

Business becomes troublesome

Apparently, in a few months, many Chinese drug shops will have to close shop, as the business becomes troublesome and when overheads get more expensive.

Same thing goes with the one man-show type Indian barbershop. GST is difficult and expensive to use by a small timer whose turnover is less than RM500,000 a year. They, too, will pack up and go, perhaps becoming part-time gardeners or car washers as a result.

Whatever, at the end of the day, customers are made to pay for the extra charges, like it or not.  Thus GST will create ripples or domino effects on prices of a wide range (variety) of foods, products and services especially to impoverished people. Many are living from hand to mouth, already they have no chance of making any savings by month’s end. Now they have to tighten their belts some more deeper to the skin.

The bottom line is that the government should only apply GST to all local manufacturers, producers, importers and builders, thus sparing the consumers/public the hardships.

Why? Simply because there are more impoverished people than affluent ones in Malaysia, and above all Malaysia has a long way to go to become a developed and high-income nation. Then also the nation's economy has a lot to catch up, especially with a weak ringgit.

LAU BING is a community activist and writer in Subang Jaya.