YOURSAY | ‘We just have to get used to this ‘new world’ and do our best to adjust.’

Movement control order extended until April 14

Newday: So we have to stay home for another two weeks under the movement control order (MCO). It is a huge impost on business to survive.

We know that Covid-19 is not airborne. We need to put on our collective thinking caps on how to run businesses within the Covid-19 restrictions. Social distancing can happen in the workplace.

We may need to change the office layout. So, too, restaurants and cafes. Perhaps room for 50 percent fewer customers than before and rubber gloves may need to be worn by all, but a solution can be found.

Maybe we should encourage people to get outside to exercise the mind, body and soul. Implement what the British are doing in this regard. These are some of the steps to re-invent ways of doing things in the Covid-19 world.

The virus will be here for a long time. Just because the movement control order will stop at some point in time, it does not mean we should toss the disposable gloves and face masks. We need to adapt now, not later.

We just have to get used to this “new world” and do our best to adjust. I will still be doing early morning walks, though it’s just up and down and around our condo car park.

It is a bit unsettling that we are being instructed by a non-elected government that is yet to show in Parliament that it has a majority mandate to do so. Can the non-elected mob convince us that they have our best interests and safety in mind? Time will tell.

Chicken Rice: The extension of the MCO is expected if we don't want to end up like Italy or Spain. However, the Malaysia pandemic plan is very poorly thought out and badly executed. Some of the key blunders are as follow:

- Instead of containment, the initial MCO announcement caused a mass exodus. This is a sure way to spread the infection nationwide.

- Look at some of the best practices in other countries. In some countries, lockdown means only essential services like supermarket and pharmacies can open. Everything else is closed. Even those stores which are opened are only allowing X number of people in the store to ensure social distancing. This is simple logic.

If it is a lockdown, then why risk people going to restaurants to buy takeaways and risk cross infections? Remember, one infected person can pass on to three people or more. The growth is exponential and it is never ending with the current lockdown approach. I can't see how Malaysia can contain the virus with the current half-cooked pandemic plan.

- Complete failure on the part of the government to not explain what the shutdown means for employers and employees and the self-employed. If people have no money to feed themselves and their families, there will be mass social unrest.

Malaysia should be a rich nation to cushion the MCO given its vast natural resources but it is not due to mismanagement and corruption. Other countries give money weekly to those who are out of jobs and the government will pay 80 percent of wages if employers can guarantee jobs during the shutdown period.

- Before the lockdown announcement or extending the lockdown, the government should have announced what financial assistance is available for employers, employees and self-employed. Without clear financial assistance, the extension of the MCO is only going to cause more mass panic and hardship for the rakyat.

Drngsc: Well and good. We all have no choice. Please use the South Korean and Taiwan way, which is to test everyone and find the enemy so that you can wipe it out.

Our way (extending the MCO another two weeks) is not looking for the enemy. It is waiting for the enemy to show and kill first. This way is hurting the poor badly.

The daily paid workers are wondering how many meals they can afford the coming three weeks, while some feast on turtle eggs. Please re-strategise.

Federal Bakery: Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin, you have no right to close down a nation without dealing with the consequences.

The suffering that the MCO causes may be worse than the impact of the virus. The PM and his cabinet must study the impact on the people and take steps to mitigate the hardship.

Closing down is easy. Dealing with the effects may require talent that our government does not possess. Or the willingness.

Tok: How do employers pay salaries and rent, among others, when they do not get any revenue? Must we all starve? Closures only postpone the danger. They do not rid it permanently.

Puzzling: Many businesses will not be able to survive a 30-day shutdown with zero income but still having to pay for operating costs like rental, staff salary plus EPF (Employees Provident Fund), utilities, etc.

The UK government have long realised that if firms go bankrupt, millions of workers will be retrenched. To pre-empt that eventuality, the government has given an undertaking to pay 80 percent of the salary of those affected. How is our government going to help employers?

Vijay47: We can’t say that we are shocked or even surprised that the MCO has been extended another two weeks. It is something we all expected and now that it has come to pass, we have to accept it. Not that there is any choice.

So for the next three weeks, we can do all those things we swore we would be doing when we had the time. We now have the time. Not that we are going to do what we promised ourselves.

Three weeks is a long time to be completely idle. In between those “36-hour days”, there would be those moments of industriousness, not too many, thank God, when we could be only partially idle.

Perhaps we could then attend to long-delayed chores bit-by-bit and who knows, when the MCO is over we may have actually accomplished what we previously never started to do. After all, we only need to stay home, be safe, and remain sane.

Me? I’m going to re-tile my entire roof. After I re-cement my porch, of course.

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