KUCHING: The media in Sarawak will wait for the federal government’s response on the request for the former to be included as the frontliners to receive the Covid-19 vaccines.
Federation of Sarawak Journalists Association (FSJA) chairwoman Jacqueline David said the media were initially recognised as the frontliners in Sarawak and therefore, eligible for the first phase vaccination programme.
Since the supply of vaccines comes in batches, the Sarawak Disaster Management Committee (SDMC) in collaboration with the Ministry of Health (MoH) only managed to reserve 13 slots in the first batch of vaccine for the media personnel while the others had to wait for the next batches.
“However, while waiting for the next batches of vaccines, the MoH has issued a circular dated March 1, stating that the media personnel were not part of the frontliners.
“This then caused a problem to the vaccination programme for about 200 proposed names of media personnel for supposedly second batch throughout the state,” she said in a press conference after chairing the Kuching Division Journalists Association (KDJA)’s annual general meeting (AGM) at a local hotel here today.
Jacqueline who is also the outgoing KDJA chairwoman further said the National Union of Journalists Malaysia (NUJ) would submit a letter to the Science, Technology and Innovation Minister Khairy Jamaluddin who is the coordinating minister for the Covid-19 Vaccine Supply Access Guarantee Special Committee (JKJAV) on the vaccination of the press nationwide.
She also informed that there are about 1,700 reporters nationwide whose names had been submitted to the minister for immunisation programme.
“As of last night, Khairy has yet to respond on the matter and we would have to wait until the end of this month.
“If the request is denied, the media in Sarawak would try to depend on the state government instead as the latter has announced its intention to purchase its own vaccines.
“Therefore, we may propose to the state government to recognise the media as frontliners so that we will be able to be given the priority to receive the vaccines,” she added.
She also mentioned that the media fraternity nationwide might protest against the federal government if their personnel were not recognised as frontliners.
“During the Covid-19 pandemic, the media were also on the ground to make news coverage and facing the risk of infection alongside the army, the police and the MoH staff.
“Therefore, we should be given that chance to be vaccinated too,” she said.
Elaborating further on the criticism thrown towards the 13 early vaccine recipients, she said the selected media personnel comprised those from Kuching, Sibu, Miri and Bintulu divisions.
“The first phases of vaccinations were given to the executive committee members of the journalists’ associations in Kuching and Sibu and three other veterans of the media.
“The next in line to be prioritised for vaccination were supposed to be the field reporters but the matter could not be realised due to the circular issued by the MoH which did not list the media as frontliners,” she explained.
