THESE two Singaporeans have more in common than just their names.

The men, who are both called Mr Mohd Rizal, went to the same mall in Johor Baru (JB) last Saturday evening.

They both had their car windows smashed and their performance gauges stolen from their vehicles.

The two men did not know each other before the incident, which took place at the carpark of the Aeon Bukit Indah Shopping Centre.

The mall, a 20-minute drive away from Tuas Checkpoint, is popular with Singaporeans.

Mr Mohd Rizal, 32, a technical officer, and his wife went shopping after parking his four-year-old Kia Rio at the mall's carpark at 5.30pm.

At 9.05pm, the couple returned to the car - only to find the driver's window smashed. His performance gauge, an Apexi S-AFC, was missing.

Mr Mohd Rizal, who goes to JB twice a month, told The New Paper: "Someone had cut the cable to the gauge."

He had bought it for $400 from a car accessories shop in Singapore two years ago.

The device is popular among motorists who wish to lower their fuel consumption.

Mr Mohd Rizal said he alerted the security officer and filed a report with the mall's management.

As it turns out, he was not the only victim.

Mr Mohd Rizal said: "The security guard told me he saw that the window of another car had also been smashed, but they did not know who the owner was."

He later found out that the car's owner was another Singaporean with the same name.

The other Mr Mohd Rizal, a 37-year-old senior process technician, was also shopping at the mall with his wife and three family members.

When they returned to the carpark at 9.45pm after three hours at the mall, they saw two security officers standing around their Subaru Impreza.

The car's $600 gauge, also an Apexi S-AFC, was gone.

The thieves had smashed the driver's window to steal the gauge. Although he wasn't concealing it on purpose, Mr Mohd Rizal said he had put his baseball cap over the gauge.

"I don't understand how (the thieves) saw the gauge. Perhaps they saw it before I covered it," he said.

He too, filed a report with the mall's management.

So who were the culprits?

The older Mr Mohd Rizal said: "The security guard told me he saw the thief from a distance. But he could not stop him and his accomplice, who was on a motorcycle, from speeding away."

He did not make a police report as he felt it "would not do any good", but the younger Mr Mohd Rizal did.

The technical officer said he asked police officers to check his car's dashboard where the gauge was placed for fingerprints, but they did not find any.

Still, he is baffled how someone could have smashed the car window and steal the gauge without being detected.

"I parked at an open-air carpark and there were many other cars parked nearby. There was even a footpath nearby," he said.

He added that he parked his car headfirst into the parking lot and had locked his steering wheel to deter car thieves.

Deactivated alarm

"I think the thief prised open the window frame to deactivate the car alarm before smashing the window," he said.

However, the incident will not stop him from going to the mall, where he often buys baby products for his 7-month old daughter.

The older Mr Mohd Rizal, on the other hand, who visits the mall three to four times a month, said he intends to cut down on the number of visits.

An assistant manager in a Singapore car accessories shop, who wanted to be known only as Mr Yeo, told The New Paper that the Apexi S-AFC can fetch up to RM1,000 ($400) on the black market.

Last November, The New Paper reported that a Singaporean's car was stolen from the Aeon Tebrau City Shopping Centre, a 30-minute drive from the Aeon Bukit Indah Shopping Centre.

The 29-year-old woman's Mitsubishi Colt Plus was stolen in the 10 minutes that she left it to pay the parking fee.

In May 2008, a car radio was stolen from a Singapore-registered Honda Stream left at an open-air carpark at the Aeon Tebrau City Shopping Centre. The owner found his car window smashed.

Nurul Asyikin Mohd Nasir, newsroom intern

This article was first published in The New Paper.