By Ida Nadirah Ibrahim
SHAH ALAM, April 6 — The number of offenders defying the movement control order (MCO) has doubled yesterday after seeing a downward trend in the past few days, says Senior Minister (Security Cluster) Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob.
Ismail, who is also Defence Minister, said there was a 51 per cent increase in arrests on Sunday compared to Saturday.
The total arrests since the implementation of the order are 6,048.
“The police arrested 554 individuals during the patrols and roadblocks and this has increased (in numbers) compared to Saturday, where there were 368 arrests. This is an increase of 51 per cent,” said Ismail during a press conference on in Putrajaya, today.
“Previously, I was quite proud to see that every day we were seeing a downward trend in the number of arrests, but suddenly it went up yesterday.”
Ismail said the sudden spike in arrests was because many had left the house thinking it was a weekend.
“I would like to remind that right now, every day is a holiday, not only on the weekend. So please do not leave the house over the weekend like you normally would,” he said.
Ismail said the police, together with the army, had conducted 743 roadblocks nationwide and with 293,051 vehicles checked.
He added that the police had conducted 25,818 spot-checks, with 4,822 premises inspected by them.
Meanwhile, Ismail said disinfection operations were conducted in 56 locations in nine states, including 27 locations in Johor and six in Sarawak.
