PUTRAJAYA: Three hundred and six Malaysian students in Pekanbaru and Jambi, Indonesia will be evacuated after the Indonesian government declared an emergency in Riau due to haze, said the National Disaster Management Agency (Nadma).
From the total, 165 people will be brought back to Malaysia while 141 will transferred to Malaysia Hall in Jakarta over visa matters. it said.
“The students will be taken back to Malaysia via commercial flights to expedite the process of evacuation,” said Nadma in a statement today.
The remaining 141 students will be transferred using local flights to Jakarta and will be at the Malaysia Hall evacuation centre until the situation improves, said the agency.
Nadma said a portion of the students transferred to Jakarta need to reapply for visa which will take a longer time while another portion are new students waiting for the approval of their Temporary Stay Permit Card (Kitas) from the Indonesian Immigration.
“With the close cooperation of all parties involved, the Malaysian government is confident of getting all its citizens out of the haze emergency area as soon as possible,” said Nadma.
Riau Governor Syamsuar declared an emergency starting yesterday (Sept 23) to Oct 31 2019 and will be extended if the air pollution situation did not improve.
The Indonesian Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysical Agency (BMKG) announced the Air Pollutant Index as at noon today in Jambi was 763 while it was 694 in Pekanbaru.
According to Nadma, Indonesia uses the PM10 to measure the API while Malaysia based it on PM2.5.
Wisma Putra in a statement today said the Malaysian government had made a decision to transfer Malaysian students in areas badly affected by haze such as Riau and Jambi in Sumatra.
Wisma Putra said the evacuation process would be carried out jointly with Nadma, the National Security Council (NSC) and the Education Ministry.
On haze in the country, Nadma said the situation in Malaysia has improved following the onset of the inter-monsoon phase today and it will go on until early November 2019.
As of 5pm, eight locations recorded unhealthy API while 59 locations have moderate API.
An API reading of between 0 and 50 is categorised as good, 51 to 100 (moderate), 101 to 200 (unhealthy), 201 to 300 (very unhealthy) while it is hazardous for 301 and above. — Bernama
