What's Happening To Mall Entrepreneurs For Determining Emergency PPKM: What We've Been Trying All This Time

JAKARTA - General Chairperson of the Indonesian Shopping Center Management Association (APPBI) Alphonzus Widjaja said that mall businesses will again face great performance pressure related to the Implementation of Emergency Community Activity Restrictions (PPKM) on July 3-20.

This is because the government has decided to eliminate commercial activities in shopping centers or malls during the implementation of the upcoming Emergency PPKM.

"We will again experience great difficulties which until now have actually not been able to rise from adversity due to the severe conditions that occurred in 2020 ago and in 2021 we may only operate in a limited manner, with a maximum capacity of 50 percent only," he told VOI in a written statement, quoted Friday, July 2.

According to Alphonzus, entering 2021 the condition of the shopping center is actually in a much tougher situation than the previous year. This happened because almost all the reserve funds had been exhausted to maintain activities so far.

"With the closure of Shopping Center operations, many workers will be laid off again and if conditions continue for a long time, there will be many layoffs," he said.

Alphonzus added that the economic movement had actually grown quite encouragingly in the first semester of 2021. However, the current development of conditions forced business actors to bite their fingers because the number of COVID-19 cases continued to increase.

"What has been worked so hard all this time will be in vain and will be disrupted and even slumped, so it is almost certain that it will be very difficult to achieve the economic targets that have been set for 2021," explained Alphonzus.

Furthermore, the outbreak of pandemic cases, he said, occurred due to weak enforcement of various social restrictions and health protocols that had been implemented so far.

"Problems always occur repeatedly because health protocols are not implemented in a strict, disciplined, and consistent manner," he added.

On the other hand, Alphonzus claims that the management of the shopping center has been able and has been able to implement and enforce health protocols to the maximum so that it can be categorized as one of the safe and healthy public facilities to visit.

"Shopping centers as one of the public facilities and as one of the pillars of Indonesia's domestic trade still have to continue to struggle on their own to survive without government assistance during the pandemic period which has lasted for almost one and a half years," he concluded.