Places of worship for non-Muslims in Sarawak will be allowed to open on June 20, with the congregation being limited to not more than 100 people at any one time, depending on the size of the place of worship, said Deputy Chief Minister Datuk Amar Douglas Uggah Embas. – File photo

KUCHING: Places of worship for non-Muslims in Sarawak will be allowed to open on June 20, with the congregation being limited to not more than 100 people at any one time, depending on the size of the place of worship, said Deputy Chief Minister Datuk Amar Douglas Uggah Embas.

However, Uggah said all the services would have to be conducted under strict standard operation procedure (SOP).

Uggah, who is the Minister in charge of Unit for Other Religions (Unifor), said among the essence of the guidelines issued included compliance and and strict control of the number of congregation in each service of not more than 100 people, after taking into consideration of social distancing of one metre.

He said members of the congregation with symptoms of fever, cough or shortness of breath and children under the age of 12 are not allowed to attend worship services in the houses of worship.

“For those with chronic illnesses (especially the elderly), it is advisable for them to take precautionary measures by not attending the service,” he said in a press statement issued after chairing the Sarawak State Disaster Management Committee today.

Uggah said other approved guidelines included sanitisation before and after the services, body temperature checking, use of face mask, social distancing, hand washing and sanitising, QR code scanning or filling in attendance books or using Mysejahtera/CovidTrace.

He said the management of each place of worship is required to adapt to the general SDMC guidelines according to the current situation, and issue their own guidelines.

He said the ruling will take effect from June 20 until a date to be decided later.

He said the announcement of the reopening of all places of worship for non-Muslims are for those that are gazetted under the Missionary Societies Ordinance 1967 (Sarawak Cap.106) or under the Charitable Trust Ordinance 1994 and registered with the Registrar of Societies of Malaysia (ROS) under the Societies Act 1966 (Act 355).

The notification of the reopening of any place of worship for non-Muslims must be made through the headquarters of their respective houses of worship to Unifor using Form PP.01/2020 while those houses of worship which do not have headquarters can directly send the form to Unifor.

The form can be downloaded on the Unifor website at http://www.jkm.sarawak.gov.my/unifor and is also available at the headquarters of their respective houses of worship as well as the Resident and District Offices.