PH sees a nightmare in flood of business permit applications

Saturday evening outside a shop at Pasar Seni, Kuala Lumpur. The government is to allow more businesses to resume operations next week.

PETALING JAYA: Pakatan Harapan today questioned the government’s ability to cope with thousands of applications for more businesses to resume operations next week.

The opposition coalition also questioned the selection of businesses which were listed as being qualified to reopen, and also whether procedures would be laid down for service businesses to resume operations.

The ministry of international trade and industry has said that companies could apply at the ministry’s website from 9am on Monday for approval to resume business.

All public activities, except essential services, have been suspended since March 18 to combat the spread of Covid-19 infections.

On Friday, the government said restrictions would be relaxed for certain businesses such as hardware and electrical shops, hair salons and laundries, and professions such as lawyers.

Pakatan Harapan said the MITI website had crashed in March when it was swamped by applications from companies seeking to stay open.

PH said ministry staff were forced to work around the clock for a week to clear the thousands of applications.

MITI will once again be swamped and its officers and agencies won’t be able to process these applications quickly, the PH statement said.

The statement was signed by Hatta Ramli (Amanah), Fahmi Fadzil (PKR) and Ong Kian Ming (DAP), who was deputy minister for international trade in the previous PH-run government.

PH said the government should come up with a detailed set of procedures and allow local governments to process and approve applications.

It said the decision to allow additional business sectors to resume operations had not been properly thought out and would cause more confusion among the business community.

It questioned why lawyers were allowed to resume, and not other professions such as accountants.”

PH said people were asking if Traditional and Complementary Medicine, hair salons and launderettes fulfilled the criteria laid out by the ministry and whether their selection was fair. - FMT