MIRI: Sarawak United People’s Party (SUPP) secretary general Datuk Sebastian Ting Chiew Yew feels that there is no urgency to have the state election as Sarawak is still busy fighting the Covid-19 pandemic.
“The safety and lives of our people must always remain our number one priority and as such, must take precedence over anything else,” he said in a statement today.
The current State Legislative Assembly will be automatically dissolved after the Emergency ends on August 1, 2021.
“After that, the Election Commission has to decide when to hold the Sarawak state election. It is important for the people to practise their right to choose their government. That is how democracy works,” he added.
“Now is not the time for politicking to score political mileage. It does not matter which political divide you are from, the important thing is for us to come together in solidarity against the Covid-19 virus,” he pointed out.
“We do not want to be like Selangor sprawling out of control everyday, recording more than half of the country’s daily cases. We are fortunate that under the effective leadership of the Sarawak government, we are able to reduce our daily cases. The result speaks for itself,” Ting said..
“Even if we are vaccinated, we must continue to be vigilant and follow the strict standard operating procedures (SOPs) from the Sarawak Disaster Management Committee (SDMC).
“Remember to continue wearing appropriate face masks in public, avoid crowds, wash your hands regularly, avoid close contact and confined spaces,” he explained.
Ting added that Sarawak was doing extremely well in the vaccination programme for 2.04 million eligible adults, with around 1.66 million adults completing their first dose and around 1.14 million adults completing their second dose.
“The government is currently reviewing vaccination for children to ensure that they are also protected,” he added.
Ting said Covid-19 vaccine was one of the best solutions at the moment to reduce the spread of the infection.
“Its primary function is to save as many lives as possible by cutting down the risks of people falling extremely sick from Cobif-19 when infected.
“No country could have predicted and prepared for such pandemic. It really caught us by surprise but we were lucky that since 1918, the world had advanced tremendously in biotechnology and vaccine development. Thus, the world was able to develop Covid-19 vaccines so quickly,” Ting said.
