Dr Jeyakumar Devaraj
THE vast majority of Malaysians agree that the movement control order (MCO) declared by Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin last week is necessary to curb the dangerous spike in new COVID-19 cases.
However, we have to recognise the fact that around 10% to 15% of the families in Kuala Lumpur, Selangor, Johor and Sabah are currently facing severe cash flow problems, to the extent they do not have food for their next meal time.
The Government, to be fair, has rolled out several initiatives to help families which are facing a drop in income. The Bantuan Prihatin Nasional will be paying out its second installment soon – RM300 for B40 families and RM200 for M40 families. This will be appreciated by the recipients, but is definitely not enough for families where the breadwinner has lost his/her job.
The option of withdrawing a portion of their savings from Account 1 of the Employee’s Provident Fund (EPF) – the i-Sinar scheme – is a life saver for many families, but there are many non-formal sector workers – the daily paid workers in restaurants and in the service sector, contract workers, small stall operators – who do not have EPF savings of any significance to depend upon.
The Government must come out with a financial assistance scheme that targets the families that are in dire straits because they have no financial resources to ride out this lockdown.
Therefore, Parti Sosialis Malaysia (PSM) would like to suggest a Targeted Assistance Programme of RM1,000 monthly to all BPN recipients who:
- Are not contributing to Social Security Organisation (Socso) currently, (if they are, it is evidence that they have a regular income of at least RM 1,000 per month).
- Are not Government servants or pensioners, (these two groups will not suffer a loss in monthly income because of the MCO).
- Those are not part of the 20% of Malaysians who paid income taxes last year. It’s the top 30% of the population who pay income taxes. They will have the financial resources to ride out the lockdown.
There are, as we understand, around 10.5 million recipients on the BPN list currently. Subtracting the above three groups from the list will leave around 1.5 million people – the “BPN minus list” – nationally, for whom there is no evidence of income.
This would include the contract workers, the daily rate service workers and small stall operators who are now in serious financial distress. If the Government wishes to trim this list further, we could first focus on the “BPN minus list” for Sabah, Selangor, Johor and Kuala Lumpur – the regions that have been put under the strictest lockdown – for the roll out of the Targeted Assistance Programme.
The Government must render financial assistance to this group as otherwise they will be forced to disobey MCO provisions as they need to feed their families. Our regulations and restrictions have to be reasonable.
It is certainly neither reasonable nor humane to require families to stay at home when the children are crying due to hunger. That will only create resentment and culminate in anti-lockdown protests as have happened in some other countries.
Malaysians have on the whole been cooperating with the Government’s efforts to curtail COVID-19 and we need that cooperation to overcome the pandemic challenge. Let us keep that spirit of cooperation alive by being sensitive and responding to the needs of those families who are in dire straits. – Jan 17, 2021
Dr Jeyakumar Devaraj is the chairperson of Parti Sosialis Malaysia and the former MP for Sungai Siput.
The views expressed are solely of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Focus Malaysia.
