KUCHING, Sept 4: Ministry of Tourism, Arts and Culture (MTAC) Sarawak will continue with the Sarawak-Malaysia My Second Home (S-MM2H) programme with enhanced requirements and regulations set to strengthen and safeguard Sarawak’s interests.
According to its minister Datuk Abdul Karim Rahman Hamzah, his ministry would continue to open up the S-MM2H Programme to foreigners who are interested in taking part in the S-MM2H Programme, although the federal government has decided to suspend the program until December 31, this year.
“As we are expecting more foreigners to visit Sarawak and make Sarawak their second home, the number of MM2H applicants are also expected to increase dramatically based on the historical trend of S-MM2H statistics. Therefore, my ministry had obtained approval from the State Cabinet dated on June 18, 2020, for the S-MM2H newly revised requirements and regulations.
“They are welcome to apply the S-MM2H Programme through my ministry abiding to the new enhanced regulations and requirements which would be effective on September 1, 2020. The S-MM2H Programme will not be affected by the suspension of the federal MM2H Programme,” he said in a press conference held at Baitul Makmur building in Petra Jaya, today.
Abdul Karim noted upon the approval from the State Cabinet, his ministry had also conducted a series of coordination meetings involving government agencies from Jabatan Ketua Menteri (Unit Pentadbiran and Unit Keselamatan dan Penguatkuasaan Negeri), Sarawak State Attorney General’s Office, Immigration Department Sarawak, Polis Diraja Malaysia Sarawak, Sarawak Health Department and Ministry of Tourism, Arts and Culture Malaysia to further refine the approved requirements and regulations to ensure the smooth implementation of the new requirements and regulations of S-MM2H programme.
According to him, Sarawak needed to continue to actively diversify its tourism beyond leisure tourism by looking at the potential of S-MM2H in order to bring quality visitors to the state after the global pandemic outbreak has caused a sharp decline in travel and leisure, which resulted to unprecedented severe impact on the tourism sector.
He also pointed that the promotion of high yield quality tourism like S-MM2H Programme for longer stay terms would certainly benefit the tourism sector in Sarawak through the potential expenditure revenue and residential investment.
“The Ministry is expecting the S-MM2H Programme to have 1,000 new participants generating an estimated amount of RM8.34 million revenue and RM31 million investment by 2030.
“The newly revised S-MM2H Programme will certainly benefit all stakeholders in particular the use of registered agents to create new job employment and boost economic growth in Sarawak. The Ministry also hopes that all panel members can fully support our S-MM2H Programme and work together as a team to make the S-MM2H Programme a success,” he added.
S-MM2H is the programme under MTAC Sarawak to attract visitors for the long term stay in Sarawak. In January 2007, Sarawak started to adopt Malaysia My Second Home (MM2H) programme, and for the past 13 years (2007 – 2019), have received a total number of 1,240 participants to this programme.
The enhanced requirements and regulation can be found at Sarawak government official website at https://www.sarawak.gov.my/web/home/article_view/221/279/. — DayakDaily.
