KUALA LUMPUR – Fined for playing background music in a restaurant, licence revoked for hosting a busker – these are just among some of the baffling enforcements of standard operating procedures (SOPs) faced by business operators recently.
Restaurant and Bistro Owners Association vice-president Jeremy Lim said this is the result of conflicting SOPs and guidelines between the federal and state governments pertaining to the Covid-19 pandemic.
He said while the federal government has relaxed a slew of restrictions to assist businesses in their recovery, this has not translated to the state level.
“There has been a misalignment between the state and federal governments. For example, one licensed restaurant was raided by the Petaling Jaya City Council enforcement team for playing background music in the premises.
“The operator was fined RM25,000. If you ask me, I think this is selective enforcement, because other premises like grocery stores and petrol stations play music too, but did not face action,” he said at a virtual press conference organised by Industries Unite today.
In another instance, Lim said a restaurant in Ampang Jaya, which was hosting a busker, was fined and had their business licence revoked.
He said that this is “quite a severe action”, seeing that the premise owner was only questioning the legitimacy of the raid.
He was told that while the federal government has allowed busking, state authorities have not necessarily followed suit.
Lim also shared another incident in Sabah, in which an eatery operator was told by a local council there that he had to apply for a new licence to allow busking, and will be charged RM100 a day.
“Why is this happening now when we are at the recovery stage? The federal government understands that the pandemic has affected livelihoods and given us all a lifeline, but at the state level, this message wasn’t communicated,” he said.
Prime Minister Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob announced on September 7 a number of eased SOPs for the creative industry, including allowing indoor busking for individuals who have been vaccinated.
On a separate issue, Lim is urging the government to allow bars, pubs, and nightclubs to resume their operations after over a year of being suspended.
He said a previous government gazette also bars these premises operators from functioning as restaurants, meaning there has been no source of income for this industry since the pandemic started.
“Klang Valley is now already in Phase 4, and I don’t see a Phase 5 or 6. So I don’t know why pubs and nightclubs are still in the negative list.
“Potentially, about 250,000 jobs are directly or indirectly at stake. These are real people we are talking about who are facing financial pressure from mounting debts, repaying loans, and others,” he said.
Get government to buy out rental debts
On the issues of rental faced by tenants and landlords during the pandemic period, Malaysia Shopping Malls Association president Tan Sri Teo Chiang Kok is calling on the government to set up a fund to buy out rental debts owed by renters.
He noted that with the Temporary Measure for Reducing the Impact of Covid-19 Act 2020 (Covid-19 Act 2020) set to lose effect at the end of the year, the temporary relief from contractual obligation provided to tenants will also cease.
“I think most tenants in malls do their best to meet their rental obligations, but we also understand there are delays in paying rent. Because of that, the cash flow position of landlords is also affected.
“The Covid-19 Act 2020 has saved a lot of businesses and employment, but now that we are in Phase 4 of the National Recovery Plan, we are hoping tenants that have benefited from this safety net will in turn take initiative to alleviate debts owed to landlords.
“But this will take a long time, and the financial stress on the tenants may be too much to surmount if there is no help from the government. This is why we are proposing the government to set up a fund to buy out the rental debts,” he said.
Malaysia Retail Chain Association president Shirley Tay, meanwhile, said while she understood the concern of landlords, tenants have also been suffering after not being allowed to operate their businesses for long spells during the pandemic period.
She is also disappointed that Budget 2022 did not include rental relief for operators, while a one-time grant for the retail sector was also absent.
This is despite the association having proposed these suggestions to the government prior to the budget tabling yesterday. – The Vibes, October 30, 2021
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