KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 23 — Prime Minister Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob’s government must avoid repeating the errors of the previous government in handling the Covid-19 pandemic, Umno president Datuk Seri Ahmad Zahid Hamidi said.

On Facebook, Ahmad Zahid urged the new government to be consistent with the standard operating procedures related to Covid-19 and fair in their enforcement.

He also said it should not succumb to populism, cautioning that rolling back Covid-19 restrictions before achieving herd immunity, opening schools while cases were still high, and reopening the country’s borders prematurely could invite another wave of infections.

"Some of the indicators that there was bias in the implementation of SOPs were the closing of low-risk sectors while allowing high-risk sectors, which are the highest contributors of clusters, to operate.

"These lackadaisical enforcement of SOPs and the ridiculous fines placed upon the public for breaking SOPs as well as the ‘trial and error’ policies catered to these regularly flip-flopping policies,” he said.

Ahmad Zahid also renewed his party’s call for more financial assistance to be given to Malaysians, dismissing banks’ offers to let borrowers rearrange their loan payments as favouring financial institutions over the people.

The Bagan Datoh MP also said the new government must not delay reconvening Parliament or refuse to act upon the views of the Yang di-Pertuan Agong.

He concluded by saying that the advice of medical experts and the Health Ministry should not be disregarded, asserting that some previous policies appeared to have gone against this.

Ismail Sabri was sworn in as the new prime minister on Saturday to replace Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin who resigned after conceding to his loss of his parliamentary majority.