'Decision to postpone Parliament must be apolitical, consider science and health'

 

Any decision made to postpone the Parliament sitting must consider science and public health in apolitical terms, said the Malaysian Health Coalition (MHC).

They are responding to the announcement that the special parliamentary sitting, which was initially supposed to resume in the Dewan Rakyat on Monday (Aug 2), had been postponed to a yet to be determined date due to a “Covid-19 risk”.

MHC said a functioning parliamentary democracy is an “essential service”, especially during this Covid-19 pandemic, as there must be appropriate public scrutiny, law-making and debates on how to fight this disease.

“We need trust to deliver effective healthcare for all Malaysians. Trust is built when decisions are consistent and when the Health Ministry, its leaders and all health professionals are ring-fenced from partisan politics.

“Science and public health must be apolitical to preserve the Rakyat’s trust,” the MHC said in a statement today.

Acknowledging the importance and stature of Parliament, MHC said it can also be considered a workplace.

As such, lessons can be drawn from other workplaces considered essential services, like offices, banks and factories, and applied to Parliament, in line with the spirit of the National Recovery Plan (NRP), they said.

“Therefore, the Parliament can safely function if it follows the workplace SOPs recommended by the Health Ministry, National Security Council and Department of Occupational Safety and Health,” MHC said.

They also pointed out that a majority of the MPs are already vaccinated and all entries into Parliament require a prior negative Covid-19 test.

These measures already provide protection for those attending Parliament, they said, and extra preventive steps can be further implemented such as having virtual or hybrid meetings and vaccinating all parliamentary staff as soon as possible.

Meanwhile, Bersih also echoed MHC's call for Health director-general Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah and other medical professionals to give only truthful, reliable, and consistent advice to the government.

"The criteria to open or close a public institution or business entity must be professionally, consistently and unbiasedly applied for them to be taken seriously," said Bersih in a statement.

The group said this in condemning the postponement of the meetings of Dewan Rakyat and Dewan Negara on the justification of possible Covid-19 outbreak.

"The decision to postpone the parliamentary meetings is ridiculous, malicious and dangerous," said Bersih.

"Last Thursday, only 11 cases out of 1,183 persons in the Parliament who underwent the pandemic screening were found positive, yielding a positive rate of less than one percent.

"If the parliamentary chambers with a one percent positive rate are off-limit and not safe to reopen, will the whole of Malaysia be also unfit for reopening until the end of next year?" 

Bersih further said that postponing the final day of Dewan Rakyat sitting on Monday and the Dewan Negara sitting will not resolve problems surrounding the government majority as well as a possible constitutional crisis.

The order to postpone the Dewan Rakyat sitting next Monday was reportedly relayed to the speaker’s office from Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin as per Standing Order 11(3).

It was also reported that the postponement was in line with a suggestion from Noor Hisham and a risk assessment by the ministry which found that Parliament was at risk for the spread of Covid-19.

There have been 11 Covid-19 cases detected in Parliament since the start of the special parliamentary sitting on July 26. - Mkini