KUALA LUMPUR: While most of the country are celebrating Merdeka, many low-income earners are in no mood for rejoicing, in the midst of coping with the Covid-19 pandemic and resulting restrictions of the movement control orders.
FMT visited some PPR residents, and they described how they keep going under the conditions of the recovery movement control order, or “new normal”, as some have dubbed it.
“Right now, there is nothing to celebrate for many of us living here,” said Mithraa, a single mother of three. “The cost of food is increasing and there are so many bills to pay. It’s extremely hard and I don’t know what to do.”
People have also suffered pay cuts. Mithraa, who works in sales, said her income has been slashed in half since the MCO started in March.
Her friend, Santhi Villaranam, works as a cleaner but one of the offices she used to clean has been closed since March, and the other only needs her for one hour a day.
“How am I supposed to pay for everything?” asked the mother of three. “I’m not thinking about Merdeka. I’m more worried about buying food and taking care of my children.”
The daily grind keeps getting worse, with no real end in sight, probably not even next year.
“Prices have gone up, and I can’t afford to buy chicken or fish any more. I hope the government will try to reduce prices and find ways to create better paying jobs,” said Santhi.
Another neighbour, Rose Jamaluddin, said her son is now laid off from his job at a construction site. This has greatly increased her worries about the future.
‘Better education for all is the only way up’
Some of their neighbours have been forced to think creatively and are becoming small-scale entrepreneurs. One is now selling food from a ground floor stall, while another has started a freelance wiring business.
Thinking of the future, residents are convinced that in the long term, education will be key to securing regular well-paid employment for their children.
Ramesh, who runs a sundry store at the flats, stressed that the country should look to move away from the affirmative action policies in education that have lasted for decades.
“We all want a good education for our kids, and it should be a level playing field,” he said. “Everyone should be treated equally.”
Another resident, Suhaimi Suji, agreed that appropriately designed school and college programmes will be key to giving Malaysia’s younger generation the tools they need to compete in the modern and constantly evolving job market.
Praising the government for providing free primary and secondary education, Suhaimi said he hoped to see more policies put in place to help young people develop.
“After all, this is their home,” he pointed out. “Where else can they go?”
During a visit to the Desa Rejang PPR last week, Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin expressed his pride on seeing how hard Malaysians are working, with some of them doing two or three jobs a day to increase their family’s income.
‘Young people shouldn’t be so picky’
Another resident, Mohd Fakhrullah Hafiz Md Khalid, noted that Malaysia has progressed tremendously throughout its six decades of independence, and hoped the country would continue to enjoy prosperity and harmony.
“A lot of politicians try to use race and religion to divide us, but we should not let them influence us,” he said.
With youth unemployment hovering at around 10%, Fakhrullah, who runs a business changing vehicle batteries, said young people should not be picky when it comes to choosing jobs.
“I see there are plenty of jobs for Malaysians – it just depends on whether they want them. You won’t get far if you are lazy. You have to work hard. If you don’t, you won’t achieve anything.”
Nevertheless, plenty of desperate Malaysians can see no way out of their current predicament.
For, although income and quality of life have undeniably surged since Malaysia gained independence, what occupies their thoughts now are the low wages and the high cost of living which have kept many willing and able Malaysians struggling to stay afloat. - FMT
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