Malaysians as a whole are pampered and sheltered by the low cost of car ownership.

Our fuel is still subsidized, it is not compulsory for us to send our cars for inspection annually, our insurance rates are fairly low and stable, and not subject to external factors like the prevailing accident rates of the make, we do not need permission from the government, nor ensure that we have a place to park in order to buy a car etc. etc.

Balance that against the fact that we have low purchasing power (wrt the average salary) and have to pay through the nose for 5-7 years to own a car, I'd say we're no better or worse than other countries.

Sure, I'd want to drive a Lancer Evo X and pay it off in a couple of years instead of a lifetime at my current salary, but the implications of such a reality are socially and economically significant: our fuel costs would be much higher, our insurance rates would be at the mercy of market forces,
there would be new regulations and taxes by the government to manage the economic and infrastructural cost of increased cars...

This is a zero-sum game. To get something, we would have to sacrifice something else. It's all a matter of perspective. We can't have our cake and eat it.