Due To The Spike Of COVID-19 Cases, Aziz Isa Urge GPS To Put The State Election On Hold

405

This morning, my team and I went on the ground to meet-and-greet the public and business owners at 10th Mile Kota Padawan (DUN Batu Kitang). We distributed 1,000 DAP calendars and flyers. We also received an overwhelming amount of support and encouragements.

At the same time, we received many feedbacks from majority of the public on the ground that they do not agree with the state government led by Gabungan Parti Sarawak (“GPS”) calling for a state election. Reason given was that due to the spike of Covid-19 nationwide as a result of the Sabah snap election on Sept 16, many worried that such incidents will happen in Sarawak.

If GPS insists on calling for a state election during this Covid-19 pandemic, this just goes to show that GPS is selfish and irresponsible as well as power-hungry without thinking about the rakyat’s welfare and safety.

Even though Tourism, Arts and Culture Minister Abdul Karim Rahman Hamzah which was reported by The Borneo Post (https://www.theborneopost.com/2021/01/10/karim-gps-ready-for-state-polls-even-if-held-amidst-covid-19-pandemic/fbclid=IwAR2D1Ft2wxgu6aY2kajC30EeyySd_MJfxFJAR60xZRZxZNfgnnWcPn3Yqqg) recently had given assurance that the coalition would adhere to all the guidelines, standard operating procedures (“SOP”) and new norms set by the Election Commission (“EC”) and other authorities, how can he guarantee that such incident in Sabah would not occur here? Will he be able to stop the spike of Covid-19 cases when the state election is called?

Currently, three major divisions in Sarawak namely Kuching, Sibu and Miri has now been classified as ‘red zone’. The Sarawak Disaster Management Committee (“SDMC”) has decided that Conditional Movement Control Order (“CMCO”) would be implemented from Jan 13th to 26th for the Red Zones of Kuching, Sibu and Miri. The decision came after Sarawak registered a record high of 153 infections yesterday, raising the cumulative number of cases in the state to 1,428. This is very alarming and it is totally not an appropriate time for GPS to hold the state election in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic.

As such, on behalf of the public, I would like to humbly advice GPS to put the state election on hold as we do not want to see a similar incident in Sabah to happen in our state.

12-01-2021
Abdul Aziz Isa
Special Assistant to YB Chong Chieng Jen
DAP Batu Kitang Chairman
DAP Socialist Youth (“DAPSY”) Stampin Division Chief