KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 1 — Health Minister Khairy Jamaluddin today sought to explain why an expatriate was recently fined a mere RM1,500 instead of being hauled to court for failing to wear a face mask, in comparison to a man who was slapped with an RM10,000 compound for a similar offence back in March this year.

Khairy explained that this was due to revisions to the government’s guidelines after Malaysians complained that the RM10,000 amount was too high.

"There has been much concern about the compound given to an expatriate recently. Comparisons have been made to earlier compounds at a higher amount. Following complaints earlier this year of compound amounts being too high, new guidelines were introduced,” he said on Twitter, without referring to the expatriate by name.

"The case where a gentleman was compounded RM10k for not wearing his mask properly happened before the new guidelines were enforced,” he added.

In the same thread on Twitter, Khairy earlier said the compound for the offence of wearing a face mask at the chin at the amount of RM10,000 was issued on March 12 was in line with the Emergency Ordinance then, where the maximum amount that could be offered to compound a Covid-19 related offence for an individual was RM10,000 and for an organisation was RM50,000.

"On 17/3/21, a guideline for the setting of compound amounts that are more reasonable were announced.

"This guideline was issued after the public felt the compound amount was unreasonable and too high. I wish to remind also, after the Emergency Ordinance is annulled, this compound amount will return to maximum RM1,000 for individuals and organisations,” he said.

One of the Emergency Ordinances — introduced during the nationwide Emergency from January 11 to August 1 — had increased the original maximum amount of RM1,000 to compound Covid-19 related offences, to the new maximum figures of RM10,000 for individuals and RM50,000 for companies. 

This Emergency Ordinance had took effect from March 11. (Along with the other Emergency Ordinances introduced during the nationwide Emergency, it is set to expire six months after August 1 unless annulled earlier by Parliament. The Dewan Rakyat has on October 25 already agreed to annul these Ordinances, with the Dewan Negara’s approval also required for the annulment to be carried out.)

But after protests from Malaysians who felt RM10,000 was too high a burden for individual offenders to pay, the government had subsequently in March announced that the actual amount that has to be paid will vary from RM1,500 for first-time offenders and minor offences to RM3,000 to RM4,000 for more severe offences and RM5,000 to RM10,000 for the most serious offences. Companies were to also be offered a range of compound amounts such as RM10,000, RM20,000 and RM50,000, depending on severity of offences. To top that off, discounts were also offered for quick payment within a week or two weeks.

Today, Khairy also included an excerpt of the new guideline that was issued on March 17, where the offence of employees and customers failing to wear face masks would be fined RM1,500, along with a 50 per cent discount if it was paid in seven days’ time or 25 per cent discount if it was paid within eight to 14 days’ time. 

Under the new guideline’s excerpt shared by Khairy, no discounts would be offered on the RM1,500 amount for failing to wear a face mask if it was paid after 14 days or if it is a repeat offence.

The same RM1,500 amount along with the same discount schedule was stated in the excerpt for failure to register entry into a premise using the MySejahtera app (with exceptions allowed for manual registration such as those without smartphones, senior citizens or a place without internet access), failure to have their temperature checked and failure to ensure physical distancing.

While Khairy did not elaborate further on the expatriate, his comments comes just after the police’s statement yesterday regarding a 51-year-old woman on two offences she was found to have committed.

Police had said offers to compound were issued yesterday to the woman for both refusing to wear a face mask and who failed to check in at the Suria KLCC shopping mall via the MySejahtera app, with the compound amount offered for each offence being RM1,500.

The woman has been dubbed "KLCC Karen” by Malaysians on social media, who had also started the #KarenDior hashtag.

"Karen” is a pejorative term for women who treat others in an entitled or privileged manner.

City police are also investigating another similar incident at another shopping mall in Bangsar on October 29 that has been said to have been committed by the same woman after a video clip started circulating on social media. 

A video clip of the first incident that went viral showed an unmasked white woman confronting employees of the Dior outlet at the Suria KLCC shopping mall recently.

Following that, Khairy had clarified that it is still mandatory to mask up in public areas.