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​PETALING JAYA: The Melaka state elections will take place on Nov 28 with early voting set for Nov 16.

Election Commission (EC) chairman Abdul Ghani Salleh announced that nominations will be on Nov 8.

PETALING JAYA: The health ministry reported 63 Covid-19 deaths yesterday, according to its GitHub database.

Of the total, 11 were classified as brought-in-dead. The death toll now stands at 27,921.

​As of 12am today, there were 92,246 active cases including 688 in intensive care units (ICU), 348 of whom require respiratory assistance.

There were also 9,231 recoveries reported.

The total number of Covid-19 cases recorded in Malaysia now stands at 2,390,687.

PUTRAJAYA: The Court of Appeal has allowed the temporary release of Najib Razak’s impounded passport to enable him to visit his daughter Nooryana Najwa, who is due to deliver her second baby soon in Singapore.

A three-member bench chaired by Kamaludin Md Said unanimously agreed to allow the application after hearing submissions from Najib’s lawyer Muhammad Shafee Abdullah.

Deputy public prosecutor Mohd Fairuz Johari did not object to the application and left the matter to the court.

Kamaludin said the passport will be released on Wednesday for Najib to renew the travel document to be in the island republic from Nov 3. He must surrender the passport back to the court on Nov 22.

​“We are allowing the application as it is reasonable. The passport should be returned on Nov 22,” he said.

Others on the bench were P Ravinthran and Abu Bakar Jais.

This is the first time the former prime minister is leaving the country since his Barisan Nasional-led government was ousted in the last general election on May 9, 2018. His passport was impounded after criminal charges were filed against him a few months later.

Shafee submitted that his client would be able to meet Nooryana for a week from Nov 14 as he would be quarantined for 10 days upon arrival in Singapore.

He said Najib, who is Pekan MP, would leave the country on Nov 3 after participating in the debate on the 2022 budget a day earlier.

Shafee said Najib would return on Nov 20, a Saturday and his representative would return the passport to the court on Monday (Nov 22) as he (Najib) would be under quarantine upon his return.

Najib today came to the Court of Appeal to have his travel document returned as his appeal against his conviction and sentence in the SRC International case was heard before this appellate court six months ago.

In July last year, trial judge Mohd Nazlan Mohd Ghazali sentenced him to 12 years’ jail and fined him RM210 million after finding him guilty of the seven charges levelled against him.

Najib was accused of abusing his power as the prime minister by giving government guarantees on SRC International’s RM4 billion loan from Retirement Fund Inc (KWAP).

He was also charged with three counts of criminal breach of trust and three money laundering charges in relation to RM42 million belonging to SRC International, a former unit of 1MDB.

A stay on the jail term and the fine was allowed after he posted RM2 million bail in two sureties.

In Najib’s affidavit in support of his application to release the passport, he said he was not a flight risk as his career, income, properties and his family were in Malaysia.

Najib said he had also posted RM5 million bail for the ongoing 1MDB corruption and money laundering trial and the 1MDB audit report trial for abuse of power.

He has also been charged with criminal breach of trust involving RM6.6 billion in government funds and three money laundering charges involving RM27 million in two other SRC International-related cases. Hearing dates for both cases have yet to be fixed.

Last week, the High Court temporarily released the passport of Najib’s wife Rosmah Mansor who is facing corruption charges linked to a solar panel project for Sarawak schools.

Rosmah said she needed to be with their daughter Nooryana who suffered complications during the first delivery.

She said she wanted to be beside her daughter to provide mental and emotional support after delivery.

PETALING JAYA: The health ministry reported 88 Covid-19 deaths yesterday, according to its GitHub database.

Of the total, 22 were classified as brought-in-dead.

The death toll now stands at 27,681.

Sarawak topped the list of new fatalities with 19, followed by Johor and Sabah with 15 each.

There was one death in Putrajaya, which had previously reported no deaths for several days.

​As of midnight, there were 101,587 active cases including 702 in intensive care units (ICU), 367 of whom require respiratory assistance.

There were also 12,456 recoveries reported.

The total number of Covid-19 cases recorded in Malaysia now stands at 2,369,613.

PETALING JAYA: Kuala Lumpur, Gombak and Kuala Langat were still without water early this morning after supply resumed in stages following upgrading and maintenance work at the Sungai Selangor water treatment plant Phase 1 on Wednesday.

Air Selangor said that as of 6am, the water supply recovery in the affected areas had reached 28%.

In addition to Kuala Lumpur, Gombak and Kuala Langat, which showed 0% recovery, Klang recorded 0.9% recovery.

Kuala Selangor topped the recovery rate with 75.6%, followed by Hulu Selangor (60.7%), Petaling (60.4%) and Shah Alam (40.4%).

A total of 998 areas in Selangor are affected by the water supply disruptions. Supply is expected to be fully restored by 5pm tomorrow.

In a statement, Air Selangor urged consumers who have received water supply to use it prudently to ensure that the recovery process in the other affected areas runs smoothly.

It said consumers may channel their inquiries and complaints to all its official communication channels on the social media or the contact centre at 15300 or its help centre via www.airselangor.com and the Air Selangor app.

PETALING JAYA: Economists have urged the government to refrain from limiting the opportunities for Malaysians to find well-paying jobs abroad.

They said Putrajaya should consider the benefits to these workers’ families as well as to the economy from the money they were sending home.

On Monday, deputy human resources minister Awang Hashim said Malaysia would not allow Malaysians to take part in the Asean farm worker visa scheme, which would allow those from the region to be sponsored to work in Australia’s agricultural sector.

Madeline Berma, an honorary professor at Universiti Malaysia Sarawak, said this decision would have a negative effect on the local economy, given that Malaysians working overseas contributed considerably to the national income by sending large portions of their salaries to their families.

“For some families, especially in rural areas of Sarawak, income from family members working overseas can be substantial,” she told FMT. “These remittances contribute to the country’s GDP.”

She said Malaysians should have the freedom to choose where they wanted to work, especially if neither the pay nor opportunities available locally were sufficient.

Firdausi Suffian of UiTM Sabah agreed, saying the government, instead of stopping people from taking on low-skilled jobs elsewhere, must address the job market more widely to convince them it was worth staying in Malaysia.

“We have two problems, unemployment and underemployment,” he said. “You get degree and diploma holders taking jobs from unskilled workers because they cannot find jobs that suit their skill sets.

​“I think there is an opportunity to rethink our attitude towards labour intensive jobs and stop associating them with low skilled workers.

“There are labour intensive jobs everywhere, but if you look at olive farms in Italy, for example, they have created high-skilled jobs in that industry by leveraging technology and food science.”

He also said Malaysia could emulate the remittance policy adopted by the Philippines, whereby overseas workers were required to send a specified portion of their salary home.

“Then the government can guarantee it will get money through taxes, and remittances will be spent by their families and put into circulation,” he said.

PETALING JAYA: A study into the proposed Kuala Lumpur-Iskandar Puteri High Speed Rail (HSR) project has been completed and will be submitted to the Cabinet, says economic affairs minister Mustapa Mohamed.

He also said a proposal to link the HSR to Bangkok, Thailand, was at a “very early” stage. This was recently mooted by former prime minister Muhyiddin Yassin in the Dewan Rakyat.

“But the study for the KL-Iskandar Puteri HSR is done. We’re just waiting for it to be submitted to the Cabinet,” he said in a question-and-answer session moderated by Bursa Malaysia Berhad chairman Wahid Omar at Invest Malaysia 2021 today.

Mustapa, also known as Tok Pa, said Putrajaya had also received several proposals and presentations on the MRT3 project, admitting that there was a need for it.

“But the model has got to be carefully looked at. For us in the government, what’s important is the amount of money the government has got to put in to make the project successful,” he said.

​Mustapa said there had been proposals for MRT3 to be constructed on a “moderate basis”, given the government’s current financial position. He said Putrajaya would try to minimise helping out in terms of land acquisition, support loans and government guarantees.

“In terms of help from the government, under the present circumstances, we’ll have to look at the financial implications. But when the economic situation improves and government coffers have been boosted, then we can revisit some of these projects.

“For these two projects, like MRT3 for example, the need is there. We’re now at about 20% in usage of public transport, which is very low for a country at this level of development.

“We aspire to go to 40% or 50% and, if possible, beyond that. This is also very important in terms of sustainable development,” he said.

Mustapa also said his ministry was working on developing a new Public-Private Partnership model (PPP 3.0), which would be more sustainable, aimed at reducing Putrajaya’s financial commitments upon the completion of any project.

In the past, he said the government would pay maintenance charges after a project is completed, on top of assisting in land acquisitions, giving support loans and offering government guarantees.

“But the general principle is, firstly, we are thinking of providing some form of one-off assistance and, secondly, the implementation of a project should not result in an additional burden on the government.”

Nonetheless, he said this was still a work in progress, with a concept paper set to be presented to the Cabinet once it was finalised.

PETALING JAYA: Maintenance and upgrading work at the Sungai Selangor water treatment plant Phase 1 has been completed and water supply will resume in stages from 5pm today, Air Selangor said.

It said the work was completed at 5am, and the water treatment system had been stabilised and supply pumped to the distribution system an hour later.

​“The water supply will be distributed in stages to consumers starting from 5pm. The duration of the water supply disruption and recovery in the affected areas will vary depending on the distance of consumers’ premises and the water pressure at the distribution system,” it said in a statement.

“Air Selangor will continue to mobilise alternative water supply to critical premises such as hospitals, dialysis centres, Covid-19 quarantine and treatment centres and vaccination centres as well as for funerals.”

It said consumers may refer their enquiries and complaints to its official channels on the social media, its contact centre at 15300 or to www.airselangor.com or via the Air Selangor application.

About 1,000 areas in Selangor have been affected by water supply disruptions since yesterday morning.

PETALING JAYA: The health ministry reported 68 Covid-19 deaths yesterday, according to its GitHub database.

Of the total, 12 were classified as brought-in-dead.

The death toll now stands at 27,593.

Sarawak was the only state with double-digit deaths (16). The other states recorded single-digit deaths, except Kuala Lumpur, Labuan and Putrajaya, which had no fatalities.

​As of midnight, there were 106,047 active cases including 722 in intensive care units (ICU), 380 of whom require respiratory assistance.

There were also 10,832 recoveries reported.

The total number of Covid-19 cases recorded in Malaysia now stands at 2,361,529.

KUALA LUMPUR: A total of 21,220,121 or 90.6% of the adult population have completed their Covid-19 vaccination as of yesterday, according to the health ministry.

The ministry also said on its CovidNow portal that 94.9% or 22,215,504 of the adult population have received at least one dose of the vaccine.

​It said 209,534 doses were dispensed yesterday, bringing the total number administered under the National Covid-19 Immunisation Programme (PICK) to 46,044,734.

A total of 370,995 teenagers aged 12 to 17 or 11.8% of the age group are fully vaccinated, while 74.8% or 2,352,464 have received at least the first dose.