Sarawak minister says rumoured emergency shouldn’t include state

KUCHING: Sarawak need not be affected by a national emergency if it was declared by Putrajaya because of the continued surge in Covid-19 cases, said Tourism, Arts and Culture Minister Datuk Abdul Karim Rahman Hamzah.

He said the federal cabinet has to study the current rate of new Covid-19 cases in Sarawak before they included Sarawak.

Abdul Karim felt that the state of emergency should not be imposed in Sarawak if there were only one or two cases daily.

However, if the number of cases in Sarawak were in the three or four digits daily, the state should be included in an emergency, he said.

“Then, we can say the pandemic is out of control in Sarawak so we have to declare the state of emergency,” he said in response to speculations that a special Federal cabinet meeting yesterday had discussed declaring an emergency.

Abdul Karim cautioned that if a blanket emergency was imposed throughout the country, even the state legislative assembly and parliament would be suspended.

“I just hope that this (emergency) is just speculation,” he said.

Abdul Karim also said an emergency should not be imposed to address the political situation.

“If it is because of fear of no confidence vote, I don’t think that should be the ground for the state of emergency to be imposed. That’s how I personally look at it,” he said.

Speaking to reporters after the signing of a memorandum of understanding in connection with the development of Bintulu Hydrogen Plant yesterday, Abdul Karim believed that an emergency could only be declared in certain circumstances like a war, a major natural disaster or racial riot.

That said, he expressed doubt that the Covid-19 pandemic in Malaysia was now at a level where the emergency should be considered.

“But then it is up to the federal government, they have to come up with good reasons to declare any state of emergency.

“And if, in the event that the emergency is imposed, it can be imposed in just Peninsular Malaysia, or just in a state in Peninsular Malaysia or just Sabah.

“It may not have to be all over the country because we have seen through the years since independence, where emergency has been imposed in Kelantan alone, in Sarawak during the haze and in 1969 after the racial riot in Peninsular Malaysia,” he said.