KOTA KINABALU – Businesses in Sabah can operate only until 10pm despite the National Security Council’s decision to allow economic activities in states under the conditional movement control order to go on till midnight.
Sabah Covid-19 spokesman Datuk Seri Masidi Manjun said the state needs to review the operating hours itself, and until then, businesses can open only until 10pm.
“If an appeal is made, we will consider it, but it has to go through the state Covid-19 Disaster Committee, which has representatives from all departments,” he told a press conference here yesterday.
He said the committee will look into two key aspects, namely public health and demand, when conducting a review.
“This decision also depends on the business condition in Sabah,” said Masidi, who is also state local government and housing minister.
“Our economy is still at the recovery stage. Some businesses may opt to close their shops earlier, not because of government instruction, but because of a lack of customers.”
On Sabah having the highest number of Covid-19 deaths in Malaysia, he said a major factor for this is that patients are often late to seek treatment.
Some cases were detected only after the victims died, he said.
“They died, and their bodies tested positive for Covid-19.”
Sabah has logged 195 virus deaths of the 337 nationwide. Yesterday, the state recorded 285 fresh infections.
While the number of new cases has gone down, said Masidi, the situation is still unpredictable as more clusters could emerge.
“As we can see now, our graph is going up and down. We cannot predict the trend now, because we cannot predict new clusters.
“However, if we look at the community infection rate, the virus is still under control in Sabah.” – The Vibes, November 24, 2020
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