KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 13 — DAP veteran and Iskandar Puteri MP Lim Kit Siang today called for the formation of a Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) to reassess the strategies employed to tackle the Covid-19 outbreak.
In a statement, Lim expressed worry that Malaysia may be on its way in outdoing China’s infection numbers, after the pandemic broke out in the Wuhan province.
Yesterday, Malaysia recorded 1,937 new Covid-19 cases, bringing the cumulative total to 82,246 cases.
“Malaysia is now neck-to-neck with China in cumulative total of Covid-19 cases, with Malaysia ranked as number 80 among countries with the most cumulative total of Covid-19 cases, while China is ranked number 79 with 86,791 cases.
“If Malaysia’s daily increase of new Covid-19 cases next week is in the 2000-region, then Malaysia will overtake China before Dewan Rakyat adjourns on Thursday,” he said.
Lim also called on Dewan Rakyat Speaker Datuk Azhar Azizan Harun to consider the urgency of the matter, and to convene an urgent meeting of the Selection Committee, as its head.
“The surge in Covid-19 cases in Malaysia has added urgency to the need for a Select Committee on Covid-19 pandemic to be set up, and I call on the Speaker, Azhar Azizan Harun, who chairs the Selection Committee, not to fail Malaysians and Malaysia, and convene an urgent meeting.
“This is so that the Select Committee on Covid-19 pandemic can immediately meet after the adjournment of Parliament on December 17, to conduct public hearings in finding out why the country has failed and not adopted an ‘all-of-government’ and ‘whole-of-society’ approach until Malaysia could overtake China in the Covid-19 pandemic,” Lim added.
He also proposed former Health Minister, Datuk Seri Dzulkefly Ahmad, as the ideal candidate to lead the Select Committee on Covid-19 pandemic.
Lim said that the Committee should also address the growing controversy in Malaysia and the world about the safety of the Covid-19 vaccines, and proposed to conduct a public hearing on the issue to help allay public concerns on the matter.
Since the Sabah state election in September, Malaysia has been assailed by a third wave of Covid-19 infections that has far eclipsed all cases accumulated up to then.
While it took seven months until September for Malaysia to record its first 10,000 cases, the next 10,000 came in October itself.
From end-October to yesterday, Malaysia added over 60,000 cases for a current total of 80,309
However, the country has also introduced more aggressive testing measures specifically targeting foreign worker populations after it was concluded that workplace clusters were the main source of new Covid-19 infections at the moment.
He also proposed for a Select Committee on Corruption and Integrity to also be set up before Parliament adjourns on December 17.
“Next month, Transparency International (TI) will be releasing its Corruption Perception Index (CPI) 2020.Will Malaysia have reason to be proud or ashamed about corruption when TI releases its CPI 2020?” he asked.
In the TI CPI 2019, Malaysia ranked 51 out of 180 nations, with a score of 53, registering a single-year improvement of six points for the TI CPI score and 10 placings in TI CPI ranking. It ranked 61 in 2018.
“It is not too late for Parliament to set these two Select Committees, as it is still possible to set up these two Select Committees in the coming week if the Parliament is not to fail the nation in the face of the Covid-19 pandemic and to provide leadership in the national fight against corruption and to uphold public integrity,” he added.