NAJIB Razak has taken a dig at Putrajaya for wanting to create travel bubble arrangements with neighbouring countries during the Covid-19 situation.

The former prime minister said it is unlikely that these countries would want such an agreement with Malaysia when the Covid-19 cases are still high.

He also said the timing of such a move is not fitting when Malaysians are still not allowed to inter-district and inter-state travels.

“Who agrees with this move by Malaysia to create travel bubble arrangements with neighbouring countries?

“People are still prohibited from travelling across districts and state lines but foreigners are to be allowed to come visiting here?

“I do agree if we do such an agreement with countries that have no or low number of local transmissions such as Singapore, Brunei, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Taiwan, Australia, New Zealand and China.

“But the problem is if these countries would agree to do so when the Covid-19 cases in Malaysia are still high,” he said in his Facebook posting today.

Yesterday, Tourism, Arts and Culture minister Nancy Shukri said her ministry has held discussions with the Health, Home and Foreign ministries to explore opportunities for the creation of travel bubble arrangements with neighbouring countries during the Covid-19 situation.

Nancy said among the identified countries were Brunei, Singapore and Thailand, as well as other Asean countries and the Asia-Pacific countries such as Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand as these places were identified as safe by the World Health Organisation.

“However, this implementation is subject to bilateral discussions and considerations on health, immigration, data tracking, and ongoing monitoring by the relevant agencies for both countries,” she said in a statement.

Malaysia continues to see a four-digit number of daily Covid-19 cases despite the country being on a movement-control order and an emergency to fight the pandemic. – February 7, 2021.