A general view of the vaccination process at the Stadium Perpaduan Petra Jaya PPV on June 16. - NSTP/NADIM BOKHARI
A general view of the vaccination process at the Stadium Perpaduan Petra Jaya PPV on June 16. - NSTP/NADIM BOKHARI

THE nation, as I pen this piece, has just completed the first two weeks of the Movement Control Order (MCO 3.0), and since it has been extended a further two weeks, we are at the mid-point of this nationwide lockdown.

It is a huge relief to see that the spike in Covid-19 cases, which necessitated MCO 3.0, is starting to flatten out.

If the encouraging trend continues, and there is every reason to think it should, the huge collective sacrifices Malaysians are making will begin to look worthwhile.

Unfortunately, in Sarawak, cases have remained stubbornly high for most of the past two weeks. Most days, about a half-dozen fatalities are also reported, a troubling trend. Apparently, Covid-19 clusters in kampung and longhouses, linked to the back-to-back Hari Raya and Gawai Dayak celebrations, are yet to play themselves out.

As opposition assemblyman See Chee How wryly noted: "While the federal government took the tough measure to prohibit family visits for Hari Raya Aidilfitri along with all social events under the MCO to address the rise of Covid-19 cases in the country, Sarawak decided that we were able to enforce our strict standard operating procedures for family visits during Hari Raya and Gawai festivities.

"Together with Sabah, we have accounted for almost one-third of the 60 and counting festive clusters," See said.

Sarawak has never quite recovered since a longhouse outbreak spread to dozens of people in neighbouring longhouses at the start of the year.

Being mostly isolated and adjacent to the jungle, affected longhouses have been a nightmare to enforce quarantine, compounding problems and suffering for all concerned.

But then the suffering has not been confined to longhouses or, more recently, Malay kampung.

The state as a whole has been continuously under MCO restrictions since January and the strain, not least on businesses, has been telling and painful.

The lockdown and even its less restrictive versions earlier are fairly blunt instruments that cut large swathes across people's routines and with devastating effects.

The main urban centres in Sarawak, such as Kuching, Sibu, Bintulu and Miri, bear the brunt of the cases reported, but there has been no breakdown of whether these numbers originated in urban centres or from nearby kampung and longhouses.

However, all get the same blanket treatment of collective punishment and suffering when restrictions and lockdowns are imposed.

Being the main economic drivers in the state, these urban centres naturally impact the state negatively and disproportionately if they are either partially or fully shutdown.

One would have thought that having had the pandemic with us for over a year now, our response could have been more focused and tailored, but no less effective, in containing the virus.

Be that as it may, calls have also been issued for the state government to be more proactive and generous in extending aid, particularly to businesses, to supplement federal aid initiatives.

The state has salted away a fair bit by way of reserves over the years, precisely in anticipation of rainy days like what it is now experiencing.

A more comprehensive plan is called to chart the way forward for the state when the pandemic is finally on the way out.

The state's economic engines need to be put back on their feet again in the shortest time possible once a semblance of normality returns.

Meantime, the saving grace has been an upping of the pace in the past week or so of the state's mass vaccination rollout, in hopes of attaining herd immunity ahead of the rest of the nation, by August or September, logistical and vaccine-hesitancy kinks permitting.

There is finally light at the end of a harrowing tunnel and it cannot come sooner enough.

The writer views developments in the nation, region and wider world from his vantage point in Kuching, Sarawak


The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect those of the New Straits Times