KUCHING: Datuk Seri Abdul Karim Rahman Hamzah would like to see life back to normal, and this includes tourism events getting off the ground.
“Currently, Malaysia, including Sarawak, is in Phase 4 of the National Recovery Plan (NRP). Everything is almost back to normal but for the (Covid-19) standard operating procedures (SOPs).
“Of course, we won’t be able to eradicate the virus totally but with the right SOPs and restrictions, we will be able to get our life back,” he told New Sarawak Tribune on Thursday (March 10).
Abdul Karim was asked for comments on whether or not the new Covid-19 cluster — the Citrawarna Cluster — would affect other major events scheduled for the year.
He was bemused that Sarawak Disaster Management Committee (SDMC) would dub it the Citrawarna Cluster, a reference to the public event held last month (Feb 24 to 27).
He said the public were now able to move freely, with supermarkets, places of worship, hotels, stadiums, markets, and even massage parlors, among others, now operating, and yet SDMC attributed all the infections in Kuching to the Citrawarna event.
“The so-called 21 positive cases being termed as Citrawarna Cluster…are they super spreaders at the event or they happened to pass by Kuching Waterfront and thus deem as spreading the virus (at Waterfront)?
“As far as I’m concerned, SDMC needs to have a relook at themselves, at their setup and not use it for other ‘agendas’.”
According to Abdul Karim, SDMC tried to stop the event at the eleventh hour, two days before the official opening, and deemed it as SDMC making a scene by naming a cluster after the event.
“Is the naming of this new cluster done with an ulterior motive to ridicule those that organise the event?
“Are they unhappy with the federal and state tourism ministries? We have tried our best to build up tourism, abiding by all the SOPs set by the Ministry of Health (MoH), National Security Council (MKN), and SDMC.
“But, here we have little Napoleons in SDMC who want to run us down.”
SDMC in its daily Covid-19 update on Wednesday (March 9) reported the emergence of a new community cluster dubbed the Citrawarna Cluster after 21 individuals tested positive.
However, on Thursday, the Citrawarna Cluster was renamed the Kuching Waterfront Cluster and one new case was recorded on the same day.
