Khairy denies Genting Group workers received vaccination on his orders

PUTRAJAYA: National COVID-19 Immunisation Programme Coordinating Minister Khairy Jamaluddin has denied the allegations that the inoculation of a number of Genting Group workers was conducted on his orders.

He said vaccine recipients under the first phase of the national vaccination exercise were determined following the Guidelines in Setting the Front Line Task List as issued by the COVID-19 Vaccine Supply Access Guarantee Special Committee (JKJAV) on March 1, 2021.

During the implementation period of the first phase of the immunisation programme, vaccination appointments were managed by the state COVID-19 Immunisation Task Force (CITF) according to the list that was also provided at the state level, he said.

"However, some states assume that they can start giving vaccinations to recipients from other groups once they have completed inoculating recipients under the first phase," he said in a statement today.

Khairy said Pahang CITF had decided to administer the COVID-19 vaccine to the state’s tourism workers involving 56 hotels in Kuantan, Genting Highlands, Cameron Highlands, Jerantut, Raub, Mentakab, Bentong, Bukit Tinggi and Fraser’s Hill.

He said the decision was made when Pahang had completed giving the first dose of the vaccinations to the recipients listed under Phase One.

Khairy said Federal CITF was made aware of the state CITF decision only after the latter had started the vaccination process for the group.

“Following this incident, I have written a letter to the Pahang state government on April 12, 2021 that the listing of early vaccine recipients is under the jurisdiction of JKJAV,” he said.

-- BERNAMA