Maldives Transport and Contracting Company Plc (MTCC) has revealed plans to bring in additional electric vehicles (EV) for the government taxi line service, to be made available for sale for the general public.
The decision by the government to introduce its own taxi line comes at the back of mounting complaints of poor quality, high taxi fares and unavailability of taxis in the capital Malé region.
The government has handed over the project to introduce a taxi line in the capital Male’ region to the state-owned MTCC.
Responding to a question during the company’s Annual General Meeting (AGM) on Tuesday evening, MTCC’s CEO and Managing Director Ahmed Saudy said the taxi line service originally planned to be launched in July has been delayed to the following month.
The shift in the launch date was down to the delay in the production of the EV taxis, he said.
Saudy assured that said the government would bear all the expenses to introduce the 100 percent environmentally friendly taxi line and the project would not adversely affect MTCC's financial position.
"This is a 100 percent government funded project. The government has an agreement with us to invest about USD 5.2 million in the initial stage of this project. We have done a comprehensive feasibility study before undertaking this project. So MTCC will not face any losses over this project," he assured.
As part of the efforts to launch the taxi line, a company has now been identified and contracted to manufacture the EV taxis, he added.
"The party [EV vehicle manufacturer] was selected by agreeing to give the distributorship of this product to MTCC. This means that if EV cars become popular in the Maldives, we will be able to sell cars used in the taxi line fleet to the public,” Saudy revealed.
The service will be managed by MTCC through a software similar to Uber or Grab concept, he had said.