Police haul up Yong Chee Kong in vaccine donation probe - The Star Online

KOTA KINABALU: The mysterious Yong Chee Kong, the person said to have made the offer to donate two million doses of Covid-19 vaccine to Penang, has been hauled up by police for questioning.

Sabah Police Commissioner Datuk Hazani Ghazali confirmed that police were investigating the case involving the alleged donation of vaccines to the Penang government.

“Yes…this morning my officer will be recording his statement,” he said on Friday (May 21).

However, he declined to say if Yong would be arrested.

Yong became the focus of attention when Khairy Jamaluddin, minister in charge of the National Covid-19 Immunisation Programme, said that the offer by a private company of two million free doses of Sinovac Covid-19 vaccine for Penang was a scam.

Khairy said an investigation with Sinovac China revealed there was no documentation about any company named Xintai Development Enterprise Ltd.

Yong, who is from Tawau, had claimed that he made the offer on behalf of his “boss” of Hong Kong-based company Xintai Enterprise Development Ltd.

Yong had claimed that he first offered the two million doses of Sinovac vaccine to Sabah early this year, but the state had rejected it as the drug was yet to be approved by the Malaysian government.

He said the Penang government then took up his offer and helped him draft a letter offering the donation.

Yong also said that the letter wrongly named the company as Xintai Development Enterprise Ltd instead of Xintai Enterprise Development Ltd.

Each dose of the Sinovac vaccine costs US$30 (about RM120), and the two million doses would have cost about RM240mil.