PETALING JAYA: Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin says his focus now is on combating the Covid-19 pandemic, and not politics, at a time when the country faces a loss of RM2.4bil a day due to Malaysians not working in adherence to the movement control order (MCO).
Noting that Malaysians were sick of politics, the Prime Minister said they only wanted to know what the government was doing to solve the country’s problems.
“Since I became Prime Minister, I have not thought about politics. Malaysians do not want to hear about it anymore, they are sick of it.
“They want to know what the government, the Prime Minister and the Cabinet Ministers are doing to tackle issues affecting them,” he said.
These were the reasons why he had not commented on politics.
“Otherwise people might say he (Muhyiddin) is talking about his party, his coalition, his government, his legitimacy even before solving the Covid-19 problem.
“When the time is right for explaining, then we will explain,” he said during an interview with Astro Awani and RTM aired over local TV last night.
Muhyiddin also said that the Cabinet Ministers were working, contrary to criticisms that they were not because of the MCO.
“With the MCO, they should be home but I have given an order that the work must continue as normal and they must come to the office,” he said.
Maintaining that the government’s current focus was on Covid-19, he said the government therefore assigned only two spokespersons to face the public, namely the daily press briefings by Senior Minister Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob and Health director-general Datuk Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah.If the MCO was prolonged without proper planning, the economy that Malaysia had built for over six decades would collapse, the Prime Minister said.
“When the government decided to implement the MCO to stop the transmission of Covid-19, we knew it was at the cost of paralysing Malaysia’s economic growth.
“The fallout was enormous, with RM2.4bil lost per day due to Malaysians not working.
“We had no choice but to make that decision,” he added.
Muhyiddin said small businesses had suffered huge losses while small and medium enterprises (SMEs), small factories, micro and medium-size businesses had all been impacted as they could not operate because of the MCO.
“The government then decided to implement the RM260bil economic stimulus package,” he said.
He assured the business operators that his priority was to ensure that they would be able to survive longer.
Muhyiddin also gave an assurance that the SMEs would remain resilient and sustainable in facing the current economic challenges, especially in cash-flow problems.
Despite the gloom wrought by the pandemic, Muhyiddin said there was a silver lining as Malaysians were getting used to the new normal in embracing digitalisation.
He said there were people selling their products such as vegetables and fish online after conventional logistics were affected by the MCO while others were turning to e-commerce for their grocery shopping.
“In a way, we are hastening the digitalisation process. For example, there had been plans to roll out e-government years ago but I understand that only about 34% have embraced it.
“I have instructed for an immediate roll-out so at least when the people see the government leading the way, they will follow,” he said.
Noting that Malaysians were sick of politics, the Prime Minister said they only wanted to know what the government was doing to solve the country’s problems.
“Since I became Prime Minister, I have not thought about politics. Malaysians do not want to hear about it anymore, they are sick of it.
“They want to know what the government, the Prime Minister and the Cabinet Ministers are doing to tackle issues affecting them,” he said.
These were the reasons why he had not commented on politics.
“Otherwise people might say he (Muhyiddin) is talking about his party, his coalition, his government, his legitimacy even before solving the Covid-19 problem.
“When the time is right for explaining, then we will explain,” he said during an interview with Astro Awani and RTM aired over local TV last night.
Muhyiddin also said that the Cabinet Ministers were working, contrary to criticisms that they were not because of the MCO.
“With the MCO, they should be home but I have given an order that the work must continue as normal and they must come to the office,” he said.
Maintaining that the government’s current focus was on Covid-19, he said the government therefore assigned only two spokespersons to face the public, namely the daily press briefings by Senior Minister Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob and Health director-general Datuk Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah.If the MCO was prolonged without proper planning, the economy that Malaysia had built for over six decades would collapse, the Prime Minister said.
“When the government decided to implement the MCO to stop the transmission of Covid-19, we knew it was at the cost of paralysing Malaysia’s economic growth.
“The fallout was enormous, with RM2.4bil lost per day due to Malaysians not working.
“We had no choice but to make that decision,” he added.
Muhyiddin said small businesses had suffered huge losses while small and medium enterprises (SMEs), small factories, micro and medium-size businesses had all been impacted as they could not operate because of the MCO.
“The government then decided to implement the RM260bil economic stimulus package,” he said.
He assured the business operators that his priority was to ensure that they would be able to survive longer.
Muhyiddin also gave an assurance that the SMEs would remain resilient and sustainable in facing the current economic challenges, especially in cash-flow problems.
Despite the gloom wrought by the pandemic, Muhyiddin said there was a silver lining as Malaysians were getting used to the new normal in embracing digitalisation.
He said there were people selling their products such as vegetables and fish online after conventional logistics were affected by the MCO while others were turning to e-commerce for their grocery shopping.
“In a way, we are hastening the digitalisation process. For example, there had been plans to roll out e-government years ago but I understand that only about 34% have embraced it.
“I have instructed for an immediate roll-out so at least when the people see the government leading the way, they will follow,” he said.
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