KUALA Lumpur City Hall’s (DBKL) latest ruling to curb the sale of liquor and the subsequent announcement by a deputy minister that the curb might extend to the rest of the country is unnecessary.
On Nov 16, DBKL announced that, starting in October next year, sundry shops, grocery stores, convenience stores and Chinese medicine shops can no longer sell liquor (“DBKL imposes hard liquor sales restrictions on shops from next year”, StarMetro, Nov 16; online at bit.ly/star_stop). On Nov 21, Deputy Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department (Religious Affairs) Ahmad Marzuk Shaary was reported as saying that the government has not ruled out expanding the ban to other states (“Liquor sale ban may be expanded”, Sunday Star, Nov 22; online at bit.ly/star_extended).