JOHOR BARU: The fate of the Vaccinated Travel Lane (VTL) for air and land will be decided at least 48 hours before Jan 20 when the temporary suspension is expected to end, says Datuk Seri Dr Wee Ka Siong.
The Transport Minister said the decision on whether the temporary suspension would continue or the VTL-Air and VTL-Land to restart would depend on the situation then.
“It is still too early to tell as there are another three weeks until then.
“What we know is that the quota will be reduced but it all depends on the Covid-19 situation at that time such as the Omicron or other variants.
“Then, we will make an evaluation,” he told a press conference after chairing a two-hour meeting with the Johor MCA liaison committee yesterday.
Dr Wee also said that his Singaporean counterpart S. Iswaran had contacted him on Dec 21 to formally inform him of the island republic’s decision to impose limits on the number of VTL arrivals temporarily.
He added that the government would continue to work closely with Singapore’s Ministry of Transport as partners to look after the development and sustainability of transport links between both countries.
It was reported that all sales of bus and air tickets from Malaysia to Singapore under the VTL have been suspended effective Dec 23 until Jan 20 following the island republic’s decision to freeze cross-border travel due to the rising number of imported Covid-19 cases.
However, all travellers who already hold flight or bus tickets for VTL and have met the VTL requirements can continue to travel under the lane.
On Dec 20, the Singapore Health Ministry issued a statement regarding a local Covid-19 cluster involving three positive cases.
Further tests showed two of them might have the Omicron variant while the result of the other case was still pending.
All three did not have any history of overseas travel.
