KUALA LUMPUR - The Malaysian Society for Occupational Safety and Health (MSOSH) has suggested that occupational safety and health (OSH) education be instilled systematically into the country's education system, starting from the school level.
MSOSH president Datuk Ahmad Fakhrul Anuar Ismail said this is crucial to laying the foundation for awareness of risk management, safe work culture and emergency response among the younger generation before they step into the working world.
He said that awareness of risks and hazard management among the general public remains low, as OSH is often regarded as a technical matter involving only certain industries, such as manufacturing, construction sites and security personnel.
"Awareness of risks, hazard management and a safe working culture is still low among the public because OSH-related education has not been systematically inculcated from early schooling years.
"The culture of safety cannot be instilled only when one has entered the workforce. Children need to be exposed early to the fundamentals of safety culture, risk management and emergency response,” he said in a statement today.
The proposal was made following the tragic Sepat platform incident in the Terengganu-Kelantan waters recently, which claimed the lives of three workers while another was seriously injured.
Elaborating, Ahmad Fakhrul Anuar said that strengthening the OSH culture from the grassroots level could help reduce the country's dependence on post-accident approaches, such as compensation and protection assistance.
"Announcements of protection schemes, compensation and aid to next-of-kin are indeed important, but they cannot be the main focus to the point of neglecting the national agenda of building a culture of accident prevention,” he said.
Ahmad Fakhrul Anuar also stressed the importance of having representatives who understand the field of OSH at the country's highest levels, including in Parliament and Dewan Negara, to raise issues of worker safety, industry fatalities, occupational diseases and a culture of prevention to the national policy level.
On Sunday (May 24), Kuala Terengganu police chief ACP Azli Mohd Noor confirmed that in the 12.50 pm incident, all four victims were believed to have boarded a lifeboat on the platform to be lowered to the sea to carry out maintenance work on the lower section of the platform.
However, the rope or hook attached to the boat is believed to have detached, causing all the victims to fall into the sea along with the boat. - BERNAMA