Hanipa Maidin (PH-Sepang) said “bossku” – Najib’s nickname among his supporters – seems to “work like magic” on the people, but added that the government should first ask the Pekan MP for his consent.

“If we create a new vaccine later, we could name it the ‘Pekan’ vaccine or ‘bossku’ vaccine to get a strong response from the people,” he told the Dewan Rakyat when debating the Supply Bill 2022 at the committee stage for the science, technology and innovation ministry.

Earlier, Hanipa, who was the deputy law minister in the former PH administration, had asked the ministry on how prepared the Malaysian National Vaccine Centre was to face any threat from other pandemics in the future.

It was reported that the science, technology and innovation ministry had allocated almost RM60 million for the research and development of a local Covid-19 vaccine to reduce dependency on vaccine supply from other countries.

Its deputy minister, Ahmad Amzad Hashim, said of the total allocation, RM54 million was allocated to the Malaysia Genome Institute, while RM2.5 million was for the research team to develop vaccines using the Messenger Ribonucleic Acid (mRNA) technology.

“Another RM2.5 million has been allocated for vaccine development from inactivated toxins produced by germs at Universiti Putra Malaysia,” he said.

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