KOTA KINABALU: A Sabah lawmaker is urging police to be equipped with devices that can help identify past violations of an offender.
Kota Kinabalu member of parliament Chan Foong Hin made the suggestion while referring to the RM10,000 fine for people flouting the Covid-19 standard operating procedures (SOP).
"There are many different levels of violations of the SOP that may occur. Some of them are unintentional, while others are not serious at all, such as the failure to scan for temperature or forgetting to scan the MySejahtera, or inadvertently not wearing a mask.
"But there are other more serious ones, such as violating a quarantine order, or interstate crossing without permission," said the Sabah DAP secretary in a statement.
He said although the public has the remedy of lodging an appeal within two weeks, this will only increase the workload of health officials who are already busy keeping up with the Covid-19 cases at their respective districts.
"Besides that, there is an even more serious problem, which is the approval of the appeal depends on the arbitrary judgment of the director of the district health office.
"To whom can the people further appeal if the district health office's decision is unfavourable? What is the mechanism?" questioned Chan.
He said it would be better if police officers are equipped with an electronic system that can help them in checking an offender's records.
Chan said law enforcement and penalties must comply with the principle of proportionality as Senior Minister (Security Cluster) Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob had said before.
He said most Malaysians agree that the RM1,000 compound is already too much for such casual offenders, let alone ten times that amount when the fine is increased to RM10,000.00.
"The Malaysian economy is sluggish and life is difficult for the rakyat.
"RM10,000.00 is more than three times the monthly income of a B40 family with a monthly income of RM3,000."