KUALA LUMPUR: Four new Covid-19 positive cases have been detected in Parliament since yesterday, Dewan Rakyat Speaker Datuk Azhar Azizan Harun told the House today.
While presiding over the special parliament sitting, Azhar said fear of more Covid-19 infections within the Parliament compound was the main reason why he decided to limit debate times until 5.30pm daily.
He said the 5.30pm limit was actually beyond the time suggested by Health director-general Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah who proposed for the House to end at 2pm every day.
"I would like to explain about our current situation. We are not really following the advice by Dr Noor Hisham who said we should only sit until 2pm because he is worried for all of us.
"Yesterday and today, we have four confirmed cases which means the risk (of infection) is quite high. This was why I decided that we should only sit in the House until 5.30pm," he said in response to Datuk Seri Shamsul Iskandar Mohd Akin (PH-Hang Tuah Jaya).
Shamsul had asked if Azhar would extend today's special sitting so that more members of parliament would have sufficient time to raise relevant issues.
Recently the media reported that two MPs have been tested positive for Covid-19. They are Datuk Seri Dr Ahmad Zahid Hamidi (BN-Bagan Datuk) and Datuk Dr Mansor Othman (PN-Nibong Tebal).
Aside from that, 12 parliament staff have been tested positive for the virus as of yesterday while 58 others are currently under quarantine.
