Fear of crime among Malaysians dropped from 80 per cent in 2015 to 61 per cent this year, said Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Dr Ahmad Zahid Hamidi.

Citing a study by Pemandu, the Performance Management and Delivery Unit, he said 51 per cent of the respondents were satisfied with the overall police service in their area.

"Some 59 per cent were satisfied with the level of service at police stations while some 62 per cent of crime victims never made police reports. And some 63 per cent said they were affected by police misconduct," said Ahmad Zahid, who is also Home Minister.

He said in a statement that 65 per cent of the respondents were worried about crime in their area while some 67 per cent were worried about walking outdoors at night.

Ahmad Zahid said that sense of fear dropped from 0.80 in 2015 to 0.72 this year. (Sense of fear is measured on a scale of 1.00 to 0.)

The study, entitled National Key Result Area Reducing Crime: Perception of Crime Indicator, was conducted under the National Transformation Programme and involved 14,393 e-survey respondents. - Bernama