FEDERAL Territories Minister Tan Sri Annuar Musa has been urged to heed the Federal Government’s latest consent for all states to undertake their own vaccine supply purchases.
Kepong MP Lim Lip Eng has proposed that Annuar utilises interest gained from the “billions of ringgit in fixed deposit bank accounts held by the Kuala Lumpur City Hall (DBKL)” to purchase COVID-19 vaccines for its nearly two million population in the national capital, in particular, the frontliners working round the clock such as the nurses and policemen.
“There is no reason why Annuar would not want to emulate Sarawak and Selangor to save the lives of Kuala Lumpur residents from the coronavirus, especially since money is not an issue to DBKL,” Lim pointed out in a media statement.
His call comes following news report that Sarawak will be receiving 500,000 doses of Sinovac COVID-19 vaccine purchased directly through a state government initiative while employers in Selangor employers have been given the greenlight to purchase COVID-19 immunisation jabs for their workers through the Selangkah app.
Nevertheless, the state government has yet to clarify the process by which this vaccine will be administered, nor the source of the vaccines.
The coordinating minister in charge of Malaysia’s COVID-19 immunisation programme Khairy Jamaluddin has reiterated that state governments are permitted to secure their own COVID-19 vaccines so long as these were approved by the National Pharmaceutical Regulatory Agency (NPRA).
However, he suggested that such condition meant the states were not likely to obtain the vaccines ahead of the federal government due to existing agreements with the vaccine makers.
Meanwhile, Penang found itself in a peculiar situation as the Health Ministry has yet to issue green light to the state’s request to accept a donation of two million doses of COVID-19 vaccines from a private company.
This is despite Chief Minister Chow Kon Yeow has been relentless in arguing that the vaccine donation would be beneficial to Penangites as it would expedite the National COVID-19 Immunisation Programme (NIP) to achieve herd immunity.
Chow even went to the extent of offering to distribute vaccines received by Penang to other states, should the approval be granted.
“If Sarawak and Selangor are allowed to purchase their own vaccines, why can’t the Health Ministry grant approval to the Penang state government to accept the vaccine donation? The cases here are escalating and there is a need for us to speed up vaccination,” he told reporters.
“The people are angry with this kind of inconsistencies and double standards. They want the Health Ministry to explain why this is happening.” – May 19, 2021
