By Adrian Lim
KUCHING, May 11: The Sarawak Patriots Association (SPA) hopes that the government will provide a loan moratorium to the people immediately to ease the financial burden caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.
Its secretary David Hii in a statement today said the association also hopes that the government will provide another round of financial assistance to assist the businesses impacted by the pandemic.
“Although the economic sectors will remain open, SPA hopes that the existing Covid-19 relief packages would be available again to assist the people and businesses.
“The loan moratorium should be implemented immediately to ease the financial burden of the people,” he said.
On another note, Hii said there should be more coordination between the federal and state governments on the announcement of matters with public interest.
He added the announcement of Movement Control Order (MCO) 3.0 by Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin yesterday was untimely and came as a “shock” to the public as there was no prior indication made by other agencies particularly the National Security Council (MKN) and the Ministry of Health (KKM).
After the announcement, he gathered that there were conflicting decisions as well.
Hii noted that Sarawakians would then have to wait for the State Disaster Management Committee (SDMC) to have a meeting the following day for a discussion and only then, they will make an announcement on their stand.
Thus, Hii believed the response needed to be more immediate rather than making Sarawakians wait every time.
In the meantime, Hii said SPA supported the nationwide MCO 3.0 scheduled for four weeks from May 12 until June 7.
He believed the third MCO for the whole country was inevitable due to the increasing trend of Covid-19 cases recently in Malaysia.
Hii added the government has no other alternative but to impose another round of MCO to try and contain the recent outbreak of Covid-19 cases.
He said SPA hoped that SDMC will also follow the decision by the federal government and implement an MCO in Sarawak which is necessary due to the increasing number of cases.
He also hoped that with the latest restrictions in MCO 3.0, it would help to curb the transmission of Covid-19 and reduce the spread of the virus. — DayakDaily
